The National Board of Revenue (NBR) has taken several initiatives to increase the supply of eggs, edible oil and sugar in the market and to keep the price of essential commodities at a tolerable level within the affordability of the common man. A notification sent to the media from NBR on Thursday (October 17) said that notification has been issued exempting import duty on sugar and eggs and import and local level VAT on edible oil.
the egg
According to the NBR notification, the existing import duty on eggs has been reduced from 25 per cent to 5 per cent – this will reduce the price of a dozen eggs by Tk 13.80 at the import level. The reduction in import duty will increase the supply of eggs in the market and reduce the price of eggs at the consumer level, making eggs more accessible to the general consumer. Egg-using industries like confectionery, bakery, egg-based food manufacturing industries will reduce costs and bring back relief and balance in the market. This exemption will be valid till December 15.
edible oil
15 (fifteen) percent tax levied at the local production level and 5 (five) percent tax levied at the local trader level have been exempted for the supply of refined soybean oil and refined palm oil and crude soybean oil, crude palm oil, other including refined palm oil and refined soybeans. In case of oil import, import level tax has been fixed at 10 percent instead of 15 percent. Due to the reduction and withdrawal of value added tax at the import level and at the local level, it will be possible to keep the price of this essential product at a bearable level despite the increase in the price of edible oil in the international market. This exemption for edible oil will be valid till December 15.
sugar
On October 8, the existing regulatory duty on refined and unrefined sugar was reduced from 30 (thirty) percent to 15 percent. The National Board of Revenue has reduced the existing import duty on re-refined sugar from Rs 6,000 per metric tonne to Rs 4,500 per metric tonne within a week to increase the supply of refined sugar in the market despite a 50 per cent cut in regulatory duty.
According to the notification, significant reduction in import duty and regulatory net on refined sugar will increase market supply by increasing imports of refined sugar and keep the price of sugar at a sustainable level.
