Compass – Muhammad Saad

The citizen in Jordan has become forced to buy “lesser quantities” of his needs due to the high prices in the markets, which sparked a series of warnings of repeated unjustified price hikes amid the absence of the regulatory authorities, especially with the approaching month of Ramadan, which usually witnesses an increase in consumption.

The National Society for Consumer Protection expressed its concern as a result of the repeated hikes that affected basic commodities, whether locally produced or imported.

Since last year, the Kingdom has been suffering from high levels of inflation, especially those with low incomes, according to a recent report by the World Bank.

Economic expert Mounir Dayyeh said that it has become a habit with the approach of the month of Ramadan that the prices of commodities begin to rise gradually and a shortage of some commodities is accompanied by warnings of an upcoming wave of high prices for some commodities as a prelude to preparing the citizen psychologically to accept some unjustified increases in the prices of those commodities, according to him.

The inflation rate in Jordan last year reached about 4.2%, according to what Finance Minister Muhammad Al-Ississ said during the government’s response to the discussions of the House of Representatives and the Senate on the draft general budget law for the year 2023.

Deyah confirmed, in statements to “compass“The difficult economic conditions that the citizen has been living through for years, which have increased and exacerbated during the past year and the beginning of this year, have made the citizen’s life extremely difficult.

He explained that the increase in inflation, the high cost of living, the rise in the cost of basic life such as education, health, housing, lunch, transportation and communications, and the rise in interest rates, which were reflected in the increase in indebtedness of citizens and the increase in the value of loans required of them, all of this depleted the cash available to the citizen and worked on the erosion of income and the decline in purchasing power, and the citizen no longer has He was able to buy everything his family needed, so consumption priorities changed.

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Diyah pointed out that the citizen today suffers a lot in light of the stability of salaries and the decline in income, and he is no longer able to bear more increases in the prices of goods and services.

The economist called on the decision makers to work to avoid raising the prices of any commodity or service that the citizen needs and to work on finding other alternatives out of the pocket of the citizen who is burdened with challenges and concerns, whether by reducing the sales tax or reducing the prices of fuel and electricity and not raising interest rates on existing loans and monitoring the performance of markets and intervention Express, if necessary, to prevent any monopoly or increase in commodity prices.

Dayyeh believes that increasing productivity in the agricultural sector and providing all forms of support so that food security remains a top priority, and work to facilitate all procedures, whether with regard to manpower or financing, with opening markets for export, and work to pay attention to food processing so that there is complementarity in securing the food basket at prices that suit the citizen’s income.

He affirms that Jordan has great potential in agriculture, but it needs someone to provide all forms of support for this important and necessary sector in our national economy.

For its part, the Consumer Protection Association monitored significant increases in a large number of consumer goods that Jordanians use as their daily food basket.

And the association demanded, according to a statement that it received.compassThe Ministry of Industry, Trade and Supply has activated its supervisory role on the markets after the rise in some basic commodities such as milk, rice, sugar, meat, chicken and other commodities.

The media advisor to the Consumer Protection Association, Hussein Al-Amoush, said that the most important protection tool that the Consumer Protection Association possesses is the boycott, and the association has tried it more than once and succeeded in reducing prices.

He called on citizens to be moderate in their purchases and adapt to their financial capabilities, not to buy and store commodities that they do not need in the current period for fear of their rise in the blessed month of Ramadan, and to be satisfied with the first-hand purchase.

The representative of the foodstuff sector in the Jordan Chamber of Commerce, Jamal Amr, said in turn that he had not yet seen exploitation of merchants in raising prices during Ramadan or other than Ramadan, and indicated that there is great competition.

Amr mentioned that the market is open to all and not monopolized, and he talked about a rise in the price of feed for 3 months, due to the rise in the prices of table eggs and poultry.