The commerce ministry will request the National Board of Revenue to continue providing duty waiver on sugar import to make the sweetener a bit cheaper in the local market, Senior Commerce Secretary Tapan Kanti Ghosh said today.

The current tenure of the duty waiver provision on import of sugar will expire on May 31, Ghosh told a group of journalists at his secretariat office in Dhaka after a meeting with the businesses.

However, the secretary did not exactly mention when the ministry will write to the NBR with the call for the duty waiver extension.

The secretary shared the information at a time when the government increased retail sugar prices at Tk16 a kilogramme (kg) as the refiners proposed hiking its local price to match with the international rates.

Upon the recommendation from the Bangladesh Trade and Tariff Commission, the commerce ministry in a circular Monday said the price of loose refined sugar has been fixed at Tk 120 per kg from Tk 104.

The price of packaged refined sugar has been fixed at Tk 125 per kg from Tk 109 at the retail level, according to the circular.