The regulatory duty is also reduced by 5 percentage points
Published : 26 Feb 2023, 07:56 PM
The tax authorities have withdrawn import duty on sugar and cut the regulatory duty to ease a potential supply crunch and price rise during Ramadan.
The National Board of Revenue announced the decision on Sunday. It will be effective until May 30.
The import duty for refined sugar is currently Tk 6,000 per tonne and for unrefined sugar, it is Tk 3,000, according to an NBR official.
The regulatory duty on unrefined sugar was cut to 25 percent from 30 percent.
It means roughly Tk 10 in duty has been withdrawn from refined sugar and Tk 7 from unrefined sugar.
Md Masud Sadiq, a member of the NBR, said they withdrew and cut the duties on instructions from government high-ups to help ease prices during Ramadan, when the demand is very high.
Bangladesh needs 2.5 million tonnes of sugar every year with a capacity of producing 100,000 tonnes annually. The rest is imported.
Sugar prices have been rising in the market over the past months. Currently unpackaged sugar costs Tk 115 per kg while packaged sugar costs Tk 120.