Onions imported by airplanes on an emergency basis have cost Tk. 150 a kg and the price of the bulb will remain stable in case of healthy competition in the market, said commerce minister Tipu Munshi. He was addressing a seminar in the Trading Corporation of Bangladesh (TCB) building in the city yesterday. The Bangladesh Competition Commission (BCC) arranged the seminar titled ‘Ensure fair competition in the market protecting the interests of traders and buyers’. BCC chairperson Md Mofijul Islam, planning commission member Dr Shamsul Alam, commerce ministry secretary Dr Zafor Uddin and FBCCI president Sheikh Fazle Fahim also spoke on the occasion. Former governor of Bangladesh Bank, Mohammed Farashuddin, presented a keynote paper.

“Our transportation cost of importing onions by airplanes is Tk. 150 a kg, excluding the cost of onion. We imported onions like that to benefit the people. If our own supplies were available today, the price would not have increased,” Tipu Munshi said. The commerce minister accused traders of raising onion prices. He said that India had stopped exporting onions on the evening of September 25, but traders doubled onion prices in Dhaka on the same day. “Onions did not come here after the export was closed. Traders increased onion prices to prevent the import of the bulb,” he added.

According to the commerce minister, the government and the private sector must annually import about one-fourth of the country's onions as per demand. “We're selling high-priced imported onions among consumers to deal with the crisis. We wouldn’t have faced such a problem had the country's onion production been normal,” he said.

The BCC will have to work more intensively for the welfare of the common people by ensuring healthy competition so that the price of the bulb remained stable, the commerce minister added. “In this way, the people will be benefited if normal competition in trade is ensured. It's the responsibility of the government to ensure service to the people so that the consumer is not deceived,” he said. The minister also said that if there is fair competition in the market, people will have the opportunity to buy the bulb at fair prices. “The BCC will have to perform this duty properly. The commission has to act in such a way that no one can harm the consumer by carrying out mischievous acts,” he added.

He said consumers are helped in many countries around the world by the reduction of prices of essential countries during religious festivals. However, when the holy month of Ramadan begins in Bangladesh, there is a tendency among traders to increase the prices of many products, he added.