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Food inflation in Bangladesh has spiked to 15 per cent, as per latest BIDS findings, which far overshoots government's official statistics.
Director-General of the Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies (BIDS) Dr Binayak Sen Thursday made the disclosure, attributing the steep rise partially to price hike of protein items like poultry meat and fish that commoners depend on.
Poultry rearing and pisciculture, reports say, heavily rely on imported feeds and medicines.
To mitigate the shock of inflation on the poor and lower-income group, he recommended a significant reduction in duties or zero-rated duties on poultry and fish feeds as the pricey proteins contributed most to the food-inflation leaps.
Speaking at a book-launching event at the BIDS office, Mr Sen explained that this figure was derived from data collected across all districts by using a unique methodology to calculate inflation, distinct from that of the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS).
The BBS reported a general inflation rate of 9.81 per cent for March, up from 9.67 per cent in February.
The BBS data indicate that both food and non-food inflation rates increased in March, with food inflation at 9.87 per cent and non-food at 9.64 per cent, compared to 9.44 per cent and 9.33 per cent, respectively, in February.
The DG of the official think-tank highlighted that significant price increases of fish, which have surged by more than 20 per cent over the past year, and poultry, heavily influenced the inflation rate.
"The country relies heavily on imports for poultry feed, which has seen multiple price increases in the last two years, thereby contributing to inflation," he told the function.
He argues that controlling inflation requires more than just adjusting interest rates, it necessitates a coordinated approach, including reductions in duties.
He specifically advocated for lowering duties on poultry feed to help bring down the prices of products like fish and poultry, which in turn would help in cooling the overhead inflation mercury.
Mr Sen notes that revenue could be recuperated from other sectors if duties in this area were reduced.