March 29, 2024, 6:51 am


FT Online

Published:
2019-08-17 20:58:09 BdST

Tanners set to start buying salted rawhide from today


Tanners are set to start purchasing salted rawhide from hide and skin merchants from today (Saturday), said industry insiders.

General Secretary of Bangladesh Tanners' Association (BTA) Shakawat Ullah told the FE that tanners will start visiting the wholesale rawhide market from today to scrutinise product quality.

When asked about the tanners' projected prices for rawhide, he said, "The tanneries will purchase preserved skins as per the prices fixed by the government."

About shortage in rawhide supply, he said tanners don't see anything unusual about its supply even though skin merchants are getting chance to export their products.

Merchants or seasonal traders who preserve their rawhide properly with salt within six hours after skinning of animals will definitely get better prices than others.

Mr Shakawat also said, "It has been alleged that a large number of rawhide has been buried, dumped or rotted for not getting fair prices but as per our estimation, it may not cross 100,000 pieces across the country."

This year Bangladesh Hide & Skin Merchants Association (BHSMA) projected availability of 8.0 million rawhides in the country during the Eid.BHSMA general secretary Tipu Sultan told the FE that several tanneries have contacted rawhide wholesalers to visit their warehouses to examine the quality of skins of sacrificial animals.

"We hope that the tanners will start buying salted rawhide from us tomorrow (Saturday) though earlier they fixed August 20 to do so," he added.

He said the merchants are ready with some 0.50 million pieces of rawhide of sacrificial animals this year which are stored in warehouses in and around Posta area of Lalbagh, said Mr Sultan.

Besides, it will take another week to bring preserved skins from outside Dhaka, he added.

Apart from supplying rawhide to local tanners, skin merchants have also started exploring the foreign market to export their products after getting clearance from the government amid record low price of rawhide.

Earlier, BHSMA president Delwar Hossain said that they were primarily eying to grab the rawhide markets in China, Taiwan, Vietnam and neighbouring India.

He mentioned, "It is not so easy to start exporting any product all on a sudden. We also need our papers done and lure potential buyers from different countries."

Issue of rawhide export will come up for discussion at a meeting with the Ministry of Commerce tomorrow (Sunday), he added.

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