Spurt in salt price partly caused by middlemen
Publication Date: 28 August, 2016
Media: The Independent
Original URL : Spurt in salt price partly caused by middlemen
E-paper URL: Spurt in salt price partly caused by middlemen
Although vendors collect crude salt from marginal farmers at Tk 150–Tk 300 per mound, some businessmen allegedly create an artificial crisis from November to May for the upcoming Eid-ul-Azha and sell the commodity at Tk 620 per mound.
While farmers said they were selling salt at Tk 400–520 per mound, mill-owners of Chittagong said they were buying the commodity at Tk 620 per mound. Middlemen are pocketing the rest of money, they alleged.
Rais Uddin, president of Cox’s Bazar Salt Mill Owners’ Sommittee, told The Independent, “At Cox’s Bazar, salt is being sold for Tk 400. The current shortage has been created as the government has seized 5,514 acres of saltpans for power plants. The price rise is also due to a syndicate, damage caused by Cyclone Roanu and bad weather.”
When contacted, Lalmia Salt’s proprietor Farid Uddin of Chaktai Khatunganj said: “We are buying salt at Tk 620 per mound. It is the highest price I’ve seen in the history of Bangladesh. We never brought salt at such high prices.”
Saifullah, a farmer at Banshkhali, told The Independent, “During Kartik and Ogrohayon, we sold salt for Tk 150–300 per mound. The farmers, who took loans from vendors, sold salt per mound at Tk 150 to vendors.
There is hardly any salt with the farmers now. The vendors have stocked all the salt. The farmers, who have some stocks, are now selling these at Tk 520 per mound. The vendors are also buying the salt at Tk 520 per mound from the farmers.”
However, salt mill owners said the production of salt had declined sharply, as the government had seized a total of 5,514 acres of saltpans at Moyeshkhali in Cox’s Bazar district for Matarbari Coal Power Plant and the coal power plant at Cox’s Bazar.
The second reason for the rise in salt price is a syndicate comprising eight businessmen who refine crude salt vacuum evaporation process.
Farmers and mill-owners also said a huge number of saltpans were affected due to Cyclone Roanu. The cyclone destroyed many saltpans at Cox’s Bazar, Noakhali and Barisal and adjoining offshore islands. They also said that due to bad weather, they could not get optimum amounts of salt.
“A total of 1.5 lakh metric tonnes of salt were supposed to be imported. However, no salt has been imported yet. If the government had imported the salt, we wouldn’t have faced the crisis,” said Rais Uddin.
