Bakery owners hit by increased global wheat prices

Bakery owners are facing a crisis today due to the rise in global wheat prices triggered by adverse weather conditions in grain exporting countries.

Chairman, All-Ceylon Bakery Owners’ Association N.K. Jayawardena said that bakery owners, have been plunged into difficulty and are unable to continue their business due to the hike in wheat flour prices.

He said that a company has increased the price of a kilogramme of wheat flour by Rs. 150 while another importer has increased it by Rs. 75.

“The Association will discuss with the relevant authorities regarding an increase in the price of bakery products”, Jayawardena said.

Wheat prices have risen due to speculation that more of the US harvest could be sold overseas after dry weather hit crops in Russia, Kazakastan and Ukraine. “Increasing prices of products is not a solution but rather aggravates the problem as the quantity of sales drop”, he said.

The price of a loaf of bread was increased by Rs. 4 mid this year following an hike in global wheat flour prices.

Officials of Prima Ceylon Ltd were not available for comment on the surge in wheat flour prices.

Chairman, Maubima Lanka Foundation and Pelwatte Dairy and Sugar, Ariyaseela Wickramanayake said there is a huge drain of foreign exchange due to the annual import of wheat flour which could be utilised to develop industries. “We should ban the import of wheat and other consumer products which are imported below the cost of production of the producing country. What has been produced in the country suffers due to the cheap import of foreign goods”, he said.

“Rice production should be increased and consumption of rice flour based products has to be encouraged to stop import of foreign products”, Wickramanayake said. Sri Lanka imports around one million tonnes of wheat flour annually from USA and Canada. The cost on the import of wheat flour last year was estimated to be around US$ 400 million.

Russia imposed an export ban on its harvest early this month since more than one-third of its crop had been damaged by dry weather.

The Ukrainian government was considering grain export quotas but said there was no need for limits at this time.