The Caretaker Minister for Planning, Muhammad Sami Saeed, chaired a meeting of the National Price Monitoring Committee (NPMC) here in Islamabad dated December 12, 2023. The meeting discussed prices and supply of essential commodities, margin between wholesale and retail prices, and availability of essential items. The Chief Statistician, Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) presented the price movement of 51 essential items collected from the markets of 17 cities. Minister Saeed urged participants to ensure price stability across provinces, seeking their oversights of supply of essential items, available stock levels and the monitoring of pricing mechanisms. He also urged Deputy Commissioners and Assistant Commissioners to strictly employ the Decision Support System (DSS) app developed by the PBS for price monitoring. He also emphasized the critical role of administrative oversight and monitoring for maintaining price stability. Moreover, the meeting delved into the prospective utilization by the provinces of remote sensing technology facilitated by SUPARCO for better monitoring of cropped areas and likely supply situation of essential food items. The Minister encouraged the exploration and implementation of remote sensing capabilities to bolster the monitoring and oversight capacities. The Minister also emphasized the need for continued vigilance and proactive measures for smoothing supply to address fluctuations in commodity prices. The meeting was attended by the representatives from Ministry of Industries and Commerce, Utility Stores and provincial governments.
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