Consumers should get ready for another bout of price hike immediately after Ramadan when the subsidies on certain items being paid by the Utility Stores Corporation and Punjab government would end.
The prices of kitchen items including sugar, flour, ghee, rice, tea and pulses will go up after Ramadan. The price of sugar has already been increased and it is being sold at Rs 74-76 per kilogram while the stakeholders in the market warn that the prices could increase further.
The Utility Stores Corporation (USC) is offering Rs 2 billion subsidy to the consumers in the holy month of Ramadan and prices of certain items are relatively cheap. Similarly, Punjab government is also giving subsidy to the consumers on certain items.
The sources said on Thursday that the sugar and flour mills had already stopped their supplies anticipating the end to subsidies and that could trigger the price hike.
“We would not be getting flour supply from next week, as the millers have told us about the end of the subsidy on the commodity,” said a shopkeeper Muhammad Iqbal of Township, adding that 10-kg flour bag that was presently being sold for Rs 210 would be sold for Rs 260 after end of the subsidy.
He said similarly the price of sugar was increasing ahead of Eid. “At the start of the Ramadan, the price of sugar was Rs 69-70 per kg but now it is Rs 74-76 per kg,” he said, adding that the new price would be around Rs 80 per kg after Eid.
Another retailer Arif Hussain said that the prices of edible oil and ghee would be around Rs 178-180 per kg after Eid.
“We were having less customers as people were buying kitchen items from the Utility Stores and Ramadan bazaars but now after end of the subsidy, we will be having good business,” he said, adding that the price of rice had already increase by Rs 5 per kg in the open market.
The customers said that they had been benefiting from the subsidies but after Ramadan they would again be buying expensive kitchen items. “I have saved around Rs 700-1,000 by buying from Utility Stores but now my monthly spending would increase,” said a housewife Maliha Amjad. She said the government should adopt a mechanism so that people could benefit from similar packages.