As dengue spreads across the country, demand for malta, the sweet orange, has risen and so has its price. In Chattogram's retail markets, imported malta now sells for Tk 480 to Tk 500 depending on size and quality, while local malta sells for Tk 120 to Tk 130.
Prothom Alo reports that prices are rising day by day as people buy malta to feed dengue patients. Its photographer Sourav Das took the pictures at retail and wholesale fruit shops in the Kadamtali, Station Road and New Market areas of the city.
The pictures show local malta in baskets and consignments arriving at shops in sacks. In a wholesale shop the fruit is piled high, and a seller shows a customer the imported variety.
In retail shops malta is stacked in pyramids, a vendor is busy arranging his display, and some sellers have cut open local malta to show buyers the fruit.
The gap between local and imported fruit is wide: at these market prices, imported malta costs about four times as much as local malta.
Photographs: Sourav Das, Prothom Alo (in the original report).
Photo: Joan Simon / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Source: Prothom Alo
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