Central bank asked to set aside dollars for importing Ramadan essentials

The commerce ministry has requested the central bank to set aside a certain amount of dollars to facilitate the import of six daily commodities to ensure their smooth supply in the upcoming Ramadan.

In a meeting of the task force on commodity prices on Wednesday, traders said that banks are facing difficulty opening LCs for consumer goods due to the dollar shortage.

To solve this problem, the commerce secretary proposed allocating a certain amount of dollar quota for opening LCs of these six products – edible oil, sugar, onions, lentils, chickpeas, and dates.

In view of the demand of businessmen, the commerce ministry sent a letter to Bangladesh Bank Governor Abdur Rouf Talukder on Thursday by email, Senior Commerce Secretary Tapan Kanti Ghosh told The Business Standard.

However, the letter did not mention anything about the amount of dollars required to be kept as a quota for the import of these products.

"We have asked to keep a part of the dollar that comes from the export of industrial products and remittances for the import of daily products. We did not say anything about spending dollars from foreign exchange reserves," said the commerce secretary. 

"This step has been taken solely to meet the demand for essential products during the upcoming Ramadan," he explained.

Tapan Kanti Ghosh said, "The Bangladesh Bank will decide on the amount of dollars to be kept for the importers. Everything will depend on the central bank."  

"The central bank will give instructions to banks on how much of their dollars they will spend on LCs for the import of daily commodities."