According to the World Bank report, rising food prices remain a matter of concern for 71 percent of the families in Bangladesh.
Before the Covid situation, inflation in Bangladesh was more or less five percent. The price rise has pushed food inflation to 12.6 percent in two years. To make it clear, people have to spend 112.6 taka for food items that they used to buy for 100 taka a year ago. Poor and low income people cannot spend the extra amount. Therefore, they either become dependent on borrowing or cut down on other expenses.
The situation has reached such a stage that even selling goods in the open market through TCB or selling essential commodities including rice, pulses and oil at subsidized prices to 10 crore families is not enough to stabilize the market. Meanwhile, people are being deprived of the policy adopted by TCB of selling food items at discounted prices.
According to Prothom Alo report, TCB trucks visited a total of 172 locations in Dhaka city in the last 24 days. Most of the days TCB trucks went to Motijheel and Secretariat areas.
Among South Asian countries, only Pakistan has food inflation higher than Bangladesh. Inflation is 8 percent in India, 8.4 percent in Nepal and 5.2 percent in Bhutan. Food inflation in Pakistan is 28 percent and in Sri Lanka it is 3.6 percent.
Even a year ago, inflation was much higher in Sri Lanka. The country also faced economic recession. If Sri Lanka can bring its inflation down to less than 5 percent in a year, why not Bangladesh? The low inflation in Sri Lanka is due to the fall in prices of energy, electricity and food items.