Still no soybean oil at groceries

Except a few big shops in the essential commodity markets, most of the city groceries were still out of soybean oil on Sunday, although the government raised its price by a record high of Tk 38 a litre to Tk 198 a litre four days ago.

The commerce minister will give a briefing on supply, stock, price and other issues related with edible oil at his office in the city today (Monday), where refiners and other stakeholders will also remain present, said a Ministry of Commerce (MoC) press release.

Meanwhile, some soybean bottles were seen with a few distributors in some key city commodity market areas. But most of the groceries did not get any edible oil from the registered dealers of the refiners on Sunday.

"We can see edible oil only on television channel reports, but there is no oil in the groceries in real term," said Jamshed Ali Nayon, employee of a courier service.

"After watching a report I went to buy soybean oil in Town Hall Bazar and Krishi Market area in Mohammadpur, but couldn't find a single bottle of oil."

"This forced me to buy a half-litre bottle of branded mustard oil at Tk 185 on the day, as my kitchen's oil stock almost came to an end," he added.

Ashek Ali, a grocer at Zakir Hossain Road in Mohammadpur, said that the dealers' representatives told them that they could not supply oil with new price tag before tomorrow (Tuesday).

Al Mamun Parvez, proprietor of Zareen Banijjaloy in Rayerbazar-Beribadh area, said that they were able to issue supply orders (SOs) on Sunday with opening of the banks.

He might get oil supply from Monday noon and most of the groceries would get soybean oil within next two days.

A few shops in different parts of the city had old one-litre poly-packs of soybean oil with Tk 160 MRP tag. However, those were sold at Tk 200-210 each.

Secretary of Bangladesh Wholesale Edible Oil Merchants Association Abul Hashem said that traders have just started issuing SOs for loose palm and soybean oils after the Eid-ul-Fitr.

Some traders have soybean and palm oils, which are being traded at Tk 177-178 a litre (Tk 7,200 a maund/37.32 kg) and Tk 168-169 a litre respectively.

He also said the total supply chain witnessed a disruption amid supply crunch by the refiners.

The government should ensure that the refiners maintain normal supply, which is the key step to maintain stability in the market.

Mr Hashem also claimed that the government entities in their discussions and briefings on edible oil hardly call the loose oil wholesalers, although they supply more than half of the country's total oil demand.

"Our absence in policy-making often causes loopholes that create problems in the market," he added.

Trading Corporation of Bangladesh (TCB) Chairman Brig Gen Md Ariful Hassan said that the agency is soon going to resume open market sale (OMS) of essentials including soybean oil. An announcement on the issue might come from the MoC briefing.

The TCB might give proposal to revise (upward) the previous price of soybean oil for TCB truck sale (Tk 110 a litre), as its market price has been increased to Tk 198 a litre.

"We will propose to minimise the gap, as previously we sold the item at Tk 110 a litre when its mainstream price was Tk 160-168 a litre."

"If the gap of prices remains the same, pressure of people before the TCB trucks will be difficult to handle," he added.

Bangladesh had an availability of about 2.72 million tonnes of oil last year against a total demand for 2.4 million tonnes, according to the MoC.

The edible oil market started becoming volatile from the last week of this February and later from the third week of April amid supply crunch.

The global prices of both soybean and palm oils are going through a record high, as crude soybean oil was trading at US$1,900-2,000 a tonne and palm oil at $1,680-1,750 a tonne for the last two months, according to the global commodity web-portals.