FROM PAGE B1

Inflation in Bangladesh climbed to 8.78 per cent in February, breaking a five-month declining trend, according to the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics. It stood at 8.80 per cent in the rural areas.

The demand for ceramic products has also declined in the housing sector as their sales have also fallen. Even, people have put on hold their plans to replace their old sanitary items with new ones, Alam said.

The industry has been facing trouble in opening letters of credit to import necessary raw materials owing to reluctance among banks because of the dollar crisis.

Bangladesh has 61 active ceramics manufacturers. Twenty of them produce tablewares, 25 make tiles, and 16 produce sanitary wares.

The industry produced more than 25.48 crore pieces of tablewares, nearly 21 crore square metres of tiles and over 1.83 crore pieces of sanitary wares in the fiscal year of 2021-22.

Irfan Uddin, general secretary of the Bangladesh Ceramic Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BCMEA), said sales of ceramics products have declined due to a price increase in line with the hike of gas, power and dollar prices.

According to him, the price of tablewares surged by around 30 per cent while the sales have dropped 18 per cent compared to a year earlier.

However, exporters have not been able to adjust the price accordingly since foreign buyers did not want to offer better rates, he said.

Still, the shipment of ceramic products rose 1.8 per cent year-on-year to $32.3 million in the July-March period of the current financial year, data from the Export Promotion Bureau showed.

“We need an uninterrupted gas supply to tackle the situation. We should be allowed to open LCs to import raw materials,” Irfan noted.

Md Mamunur Rashid, additional managing director of X Ceramics Group, says people are grappling with a higher cost of living so they don’t have scopes to purchase non-essential items such as ceramics.

Ruslan Nasir, deputy managing director of Mir Ceramic Limited, says the ceramic business is related to the construction industry.

“Since the construction industry itself is now in the slow lane, its impact has fallen on the ceramics sector.”

Besides, he said, low pressure of gas is hampering the production of ceramic products. “Ceramic manufacturing units need full pressure of gas. Otherwise, the quality of products can’t be ensured. Owing to the inadequate supply of gas, the ceramics sector is in trouble.”

Avenue Sangma, brand manager of Tilottoma Bangla Group, says the housing sector has adopted a cautious approach owing to the ongoing economic uncertainty.

“This has affected the sales of sanitary products and tiles.”

The company retails imported bath and spa solutions, wall and floor solutions and modular kitchen solutions in the premium segment.

“Since high-end customers are our target clients, the business is slightly better in the premium segment compared to the general segment. But the overall sales in the ceramics sector are not impressive at the moment.”

The market size of the local ceramics sector was Tk 7,247 crore in 2021-22, up from Tk 6,024 crore in the previous financial year.

Local manufacturers meet 87.29 per cent of the domestic demand, which has been growing at 12.71 per cent annually on average for the last few years, according to Irfan.