SUKANTA HALDER

Many consumers said they are still not getting bottled soybean oil in kitchen markets in various parts of the country including Dhaka despite the government allowing refiners to hike prices of the essential cooking ingredient two days ago.

Retailers say they are not getting enough bottled oil to meet the demand, while superstores are also struggling to manage their edible oil stocks.

The scarcity even forced some online grocery platforms to modify their oil options. Sahana Parvin, a 32-year-old resident of Dhanmondi area in Dhaka, described her experience while shopping online.

“I found only one option for soybean oil -- 1 litre bottles. There were no 2 or 5 litre ones,” Parvin told The Daily Star yesterday.

She said that while other oils like sunflower and mustard were available, bottled soybean oil seemed to be the “missing product”.

The shortage of bottled soybean oil has been continuing for nearly a month. As it almost vanished from kitchen markets across the country owing to a limited supply by refiners, the government on Monday allowed them to raise the retail prices of soybean and palm oils by Tk 8 per litre.

Bottled soybean oil is now at Tk 175, while non-brand loose soybean oil and super palm oil are at Tk 157.

Meanwhile, retailers in Khulna, Chattogram and Dhaka said dealers have started supplying bottled soybean oil after the price hike, but the supply still falls short of the demand.

Refiners anticipated a supply normalisation at the retail level within the next few days.

Abdur Rab, a retailer from Khulna City, told The Daily Star that he was receiving only 25 to 30 percent of his required soybean oil supply. While Fresh brand is supplying regularly, other brands are not.

Sabbir Hasan Nasir, managing director at supershop chain Shwapno, said amid the peak of the bottled oil crunch, they even asked the authorities to allow them to sell loose soybean oil.

“Before the latest price hike of bottled soybean oil, we used to get 30 to 40 percent of the demand. Now that rises slightly to 50 percent, but it is still low to smoothly manage the daily operation,” he said.

Md Ismail Hossain, another retailer from Kazir Dewri in Chattogram, said that he was only receiving Rupchanda brand soybean oil, but not in sufficient quantities. “As per demand, we only got 30 percent of the oil from the company dealers.”

Pana Saha, a grocery wholesaler in Barisal’s Bazar Road area, reported a similar supply crunch.

He, however, said dealers have assured him that the supply will normalise by next Saturday.

A housewife from Barisal said she shifted to using mustard oil due to the soybean oil shortage, but mustard oil prices are also on the rise.