Businesses will now be able to import eight essential goods on deferred payment basis as the central bank has announced such facilities aiming to keep supply of these commodities available during the upcoming holy month of Ramadan.
These commodities are edible oil, chickpea, pulse, pea, onion, spices, sugar and date.
“The central bank has given this privilege to the authorized importers to make the supply of these commodities available during the Ramadan and to keep prices of these products at tolerable limit,” said director of Foreign Exchange Policy Department (FEPD) of the Bangladesh Bank (BB) Md Sarwar Hossain.
The FEPD has issued a circular today in this regard, he said, adding that the circular has been issued to overcome the supply crunch of these essentials during the Ramadan.
Under the facility, the authorized dealers will be allowed to open Letter of Credits (LCs) for the import of these goods on deferred payment terms up to 90 days under suppliers/buyers’ credit scheme.
The facility will remain applicable from the date of initiation of imports till March 31, 2023.
The latest central bank circular came after a BB instruction that allowed all scheduled banks to keep cash margin of the import LCs at the lowest level as per the relations between banks and subscribers.
