Not a single sack of potatoes sold in four days, workers are playing ludu

Not a single sack of potatoes from Al Medina Cold Storage in Munshiganj’s Baghia Bazar of Tongibari Upazila has been sold in the last four days. As a result, workers in that cold storage are wasting their time lazily.

Traders have stopped selling potatoes in cold rooms since the government set the price for potatoes. They do not sell potatoes despite having extra stock.

Traders say they bought and stored potatoes at 40-42 Tk per kg 8-10 days ago. Now the government is asking to sell potatoes at 23 Tk per kg. If it is sold at that price, there will be a loss of Rs 18-20 per kg. That is why they have stopped selling potatoes in cold rooms.

The Agricultural Marketing Department has sent a letter to the Deputy Commissioners to control the price of potatoes at the cold storage level at Tk 23, wholesale at Tk 25 and at the retail market at Tk 30. This is why The main reason why traders have stopped selling potatoes in cold rooms.

A visit to the Al Medina cold room in Baghia Bazar on Saturday (October 18) revealed that the whole cold room was empty. Some of the 50+ store workers are talking, some are playing cards, some are playing ludu.

Cold storage workers Saiful, Nurnabi, Halim and Sanwar said, “We have been working in this store for eight years.” Now is the season. But the sale of potatoes stopped. No trader will come to sell potatoes in cold rooms. We have been sitting lazy for four days. I am sitting and eating the money saved. I have never seen this situation before.

They also said that we used to earn between 500 and 600 rupees every day. This is how the family lived. But now we are frustrated because there is no work.

Nazrul Islam, manager of cold storage, said that since the government set the price for potatoes, no one has come to cold storage to sell potatoes. Traders used to buy potatoes at higher prices, but now they don’t sell them, as there will be a loss if the government sells them at the fixed price.

He further said that four lakhs of potato sacks can be kept in our cold store. Due to the low production this year, 250,000 bags of potatoes were stored in cold rooms. There are currently a lakh of potato sacks in cold stores. Of this, 70,000 sacks of seed potatoes. The remaining 30,000 bags are for sale.

Meanwhile, potatoes are not sold anywhere in Munshiganj at the price set by the government. It is sold at Rs 45-50 per kg on the retail market. Buyers have expressed anger at this.

AM / JIM