Fake ship furniture trade on the rise

Ship furniture on sale at a roadside shop at Faujderhat in Sitakunda. (Right) Carpenters are making furniture using cheap local timber, but these will be sold as ship furniture. PHOTO: STAR

Every year several ocean going ships are dismantled at different yards along the coast at Sitakunda to procure various items such as steel, electronic devices, oil, toiletries and furniture.

The business on old furniture or ship furniture started with the inception of ship- breaking at Sitakunda in the district in the early eighties.

Having the nearby ship-breaking industries as its prime source, the business grew up along over a ten-kilometer stretch of Dhaka-Chittagong highway from Pahartoli Colonelhat to Madambibirhat under Sitakunda upazila.

Local businessmen used to buy the furniture in a lot at auction from a ship grounded for dismantling. Each ship, particularly the merchant ship, has a lot of furniture, including beds, tables, sofas, chest of drawers, shelves and doors. Furniture were put on sale in original form and in a very few cases after a little repair of damaged parts if there was any.

The ship furniture with very simple but sophisticated designs and reasonable durability was of a tremendous demand. The furniture are also very light in weight and available here at cheap price.

People, particularly housewives, who had long been craving for household furniture but could not afford new ones, rushed for ship furniture. In the ship furniture shops a double bed (box typed plank) will cost around Tk 3000, a semi-double one Tk 2500 and a single-bed (divan like one) Tk 2000. The shops offered a dinning table at Tk 1500 and a chest of drawer at Tk 2500. The price of a set of sofa ranged from Tk 4,500 to 14,000, sources said.

They are also of a higher demand to the bachelors as the latter can easily buy furniture like single-bed, chest of drawers and reading tables within Tk 6 thousand.

But original piece of ship furniture is difficult to be found there now, users said.

They said that both the quality and design of the ship furniture had dropped remarkably.

The traders now reportedly make furniture of "kerosine" wood, partex like hardboards and plywood with formica in the name of ship furniture, they added.

One Saiful Islam said that once the ship furniture was known for their durability, but at present they are remade. Today the furniture develops cracks on it within a very short time and are worn out in five years, he said.

Shah Nawaj, a professional in the city, said that most of the materials used in ship furniture were bought from the local markets while one Mamun of Sitakunda said that 10 percent of the materials of the ship furniture came from ship.

On the other hand, traders denying the allegation said that import of tankers instead of merchant ships was responsible for the non-availability of ship furniture in original forms.

Jamal Uddin, manager of a furniture shop at Pahartoli, said that a merchant ship brought for dismantling provided a lot of furniture while the tankers a few.

The original colour of ship furniture is also changed during the remaking, the users said.

The businessmen now redesign the furniture, coat them in teak colour removing the original sophisticated white-bony colour, they said.