Trade
4 years ago

City consumers witness short supply of few grocery items

File photo (Collected)
File photo (Collected)

Published :

Updated :

The city consumers witnessed short supply of few grocery items on Saturday, the third day of the ten-day holiday declared by the government amid coronavirus pandemic.

There were shortages of pasteurised liquid milk, semolina (sooji), dish cleaner, hand wash, mosquito coil in the groceries in many places on the day, according to market sources.

Traders said representatives of most companies were not coming regularly, causing supply disruption.

Jamal Uddin Mridha, executive of an insurance company, was looking for pasteurised milk of Milk Vita brand at Jafrabad in the morning, but he did not get the item - be it Milk Vita or other brands like Aarong.

Mr. Mridha depends only on pasteurised milk for his four-year-old baby girl as she has allergic problem of other commercial formula foods.

Kamal Hossain Laal, owner of a grocery store at East Rayer Bazar, told the FE that the representatives of Milk Vita and Aarong last supplied the item on March 26 and the stock exhausted on Friday.

Pran Milk delivered few packs on Saturday but was not enough to meet the demand, he said. Milk Vita van pullers informed that their supply would remain suspended for next few days.

He said there is also shortage of semolina, liquid hand wash, liquid dish cleaner, mosquito coil/ spray, biscuits of some companies amid short supply.

Contacted, Milk Vita spokesperson Shuchisman Biswas told the FE that the company is continuing with supply of milk. "But, we've just cut the production to 60,000 litres a day from 0.1 million litres as Dhaka city is half empty."

He added that many of the van pullers, who supply the item to groceries, have already left the city amid the virus pandemic, causing supply shortage in some places. "But you will get our products 24 hours at our outlets and at Unimart superstore."

Mr Biswas said all the brands supply 0.22 to 0.25 million litres of pasteurised milk every day across the country - Dhaka and Chattogram consume 90 per cent. The supply has almost been halved in last seven days, he added.

Consumers Association of Bangladesh (CAB) secretary Humayun Kabir Bhuiyan said the government will have to ensure smooth supply of perishable items so that people could get them easily.

He said the city consumers are not getting milk at a time when the dairy farmers were suffering a lot with their unsold milks. The companies should be asked to ensure smooth supply of daily essentials and grocery items, he said.

[email protected]

Share this news