Price of essentials tolerable: Tipu Munshi

When the public is struggling to cope up with the skyrocketing price of essentials, Commerce Minister Tipu Munshi today (September 1, 2022) in parliament claimed that the price of daily necessities are at tolerable levels.

In response to the question of Jatiya Party MP Mujibul Huque Chunnu, Tipu Munshi said various steps have been taken to keep the price of daily necessities within reach of the consumers.

In response to a query from Awami League MP Ebadul Karim, the commerce minister said Bangladesh exported goods to 203 countries in the financial year 2021-22.

Out of these, Bangladesh has trade deficit with 91 countries and trade balance with 112 countries is in favour of Bangladesh.

In the 2021-22 financial year, the export amount is USD 6 billion and the import amount is USD 8.2 billion.

That means the trade deficit in the financial year 2021-22 is USD 2.1 billion.

In response to a query from another AL MP Benjir Ahmed, the minister said that the trade deficit with the SAARC countries in the financial year 2021-22 is USD 1.19 billion.

In the 2021-22 financial year, the trade deficit with China is USD 1.93 billion.

The minister said that some 8,930 products (98 percent) have received duty-free quota-free access to the Chinese market due to the government's efforts from today.

As a result, exports to China will increase and the trade deficit will decrease, he said.

In response to a query from AL MP Ali Azam, Food Minister Sadhan Chandra Majumder said that currently (August 30, 2022) the country has 19,50,531 metric tonnes of food grains.

He said that to import wheat from Russia and rice from India, Myanmar and Vietnam the government has taken the G2G system.