A shopping cart is pushed down the aisle in this REUTERS photo illustration.
Overall, a 5-10% special discount has been given on over a 1,000 items and the price cuts will range between Rs7 and Rs40.
Sugar, which is available at retail price of Rs75 per kg, will be sold at Rs68 per kg at Utility Stores.
The prices of ghee and edible oil have been reduced by Rs30-Rs40 per kg. Ghee will be sold at Rs170 per kg. The rates of pulses and rice price have been slashed by Rs20-Rs31.
Addressing a news conference, Special Assistant to the PM on Information Firdous Ashiq Awan said Utility Stores would enter the CNIC numbers of the buyers availing the subsidy into their records.
“Customers will be able to buy their monthly groceries from Utility Stores only once a month,” she added.
The PM’s aide further said the Utility Store Corporation (USC) had completed the purchase of essential commodities worth Rs5 billion that would suffice till March this year.
She added that 0.2 million tonnes of wheat had been acquired from the Pakistan Agriculture Storage and Service Corporation at cheaper rates.
In the near future, ration cards will be given to 50 million poor families.
USC Chairman Zulqarnain Ali Khan, who was also present at the news conference, said he was heading the corporation for over a year.
“I had inherited the USC with Rs14 billion in arrears,” he maintained.
The USC chairman said the corporation’s employees had staged a sit-in soon after the PTI government had come to power but the PM had directed not to dismiss any of its 14,000 workers.
“It is with the same team that the USC is now ready to serve the public with the new relief package,” he added.
Giving details about the efforts to revamp the USC, the chairman said an IT system was being installed at all Utility Stores. The USC has introduced its own ghee as the rates of the branded ones were way too high.
“It is unfortunate that we have to import pulses worth $1.5 million despite being an agricultural country. This is the reason being the skyrocketing prices of pulses and edible oil.”
USC Managing Director Omer Lodhi said all products being sold by the USC at subsidised rates carried a special stamp.
“Zonal and regional managers of the USC will be held responsible if any other shop is seen selling USC products and legal action would be taken,” he added.
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