Prices of vegetables saw a fresh decline in Dhaka markets bringing some sorts of relief to the city dwellers.
On the other hand, prices of rice, atta, flour, edible oil, sugar, and lentils were found stable in the Dhaka markets.
During a visit to different markets in Dhaka, it was found that the prices of different vegetables were on a falling trend in the last week.
At the outset of the holy Ramadan, the unit price of most of the vegetables including cucumber, aubergine, pointed guard, yard long bean, okra, ladies finger and snake guard was on an average of Tk80-90 per kg, which are now being sold at Tk50-60 per kg.
Besides, the prices of potatoes, onion and tomatoes are being sold at a cheaper price in the Dhaka markets.
At the wholesale level, onion and potato are now being sold respectively at Tk17 and Tk13 per kg while they are being sold at Tk25-30 per kg at the retail level.
“Huge amount of onion already have been imported from India and harvesting of local onion caused a drastic fall in the onion price,” said M Jahangir Hossein Molla, a wholesaler of Shah Ali School and College Market of Mirpur section-1.
Since there is a huge amount of onions remaining in stocks at the market so, there is no chance to raise the onion price during this time, said another retailer Anowar Mollah of Dhaka’s main hub Kawran Bazar.
The prices of some newly arrived vegetables were found higher but the prices of other vegetables remained at a tolerable limit, said a vegetable seller, Lokman Hossain of Mirpur Shah Ali Market.
“If there is no natural disaster in the coming days, the price of most of the vegetables will further decline,” said another vegetable seller Jahangir Hossain of Shantinagar Bazar.
In addition to this, the prices of rice, atta, lentil, edible oil and sugar have remained stable—medium quality rice ‘paijam’ and BR-28 are now being sold at Tk46 and Tk48 while the fine quality miniket and nazir are being sold at Tk65 and Tk70 per kg respectively.
“The rice price will decline more in the coming days particularly after the month of Baishak as new harvest will arrive in the market,” said Mizan, a rice seller of Kawran Bazar.
Prices of all types of fish were found higher in the markets as the price of one-kg size is Tk1400-1500. The fish traders attributed the price hike of all types of fish to the imposition of a ban on fishing by the government.
The government has imposed a ban on catching, selling, hoarding and transporting Hilsa fish for two months from March 1 in order to increase production.
Moreover, now the beef is being sold at Tk 680 per kg, and mutton at Tk 850-950 per kg while the price of local chicken is soaring at Tk 550 per kg.
