Sharp drop in prices of essential goods

By L.S. Ananda Wedaarachchi

Prices of essential food items such as rice, sugar, big onions canned fish, sprats, chicken and eggs had dropped during the past few months due to the timely decisions taken by the Co-operatives and Internal Trade Minister Jhonston Fernando.

Co-operatives and Internal Trade Ministry Secretary, Sunil Sirisena said that 'Lanka Sathosa' and 'Co-op City' supermarket networks helped the government efforts to provide essential food items at reasonable prices. 'Co-op City' and 'Lanka Sathosa' supermarket networks and the State Trading Corporation (STC), which handle imports, distribution and marketing helped break the private sector monopoly on distribution, and marketing of food items, he said.

Lanka Sathosa is the biggest supermarket chain with 240 outlets.

Another 100 outlets will be set up this year.

A loan of Rs. 800 million was granted to co-operative societies on the instructions of President Mahinda Rajapaksa before the last New Year season, this helped co-operative societies to maintain adequate food stocks to meet the New Year demand, he said.

Eggs and chicken prices increased to Rs. 20 per egg and Rs. 450 for a Kilo of chicken during last Christmas, mainly due to action on the part of paultry farm owners.

They were against the import of chicks and chicken meat.

They also opposed the ministry move to expand the poultry industry.

The National Livestock Development Board (NLDB) imported 100,000 chicks for local small-scale poultry farm owners, he said.

Consequently, eggs and chicken prices dropped to Rs. 9 per egg and Rs. 325 per kilo of chicken and are now freely available at "Lanka Sathosa" supermarkets and "Co-op Cities", the Secretary said.

Chicken and sugar prices have been brought down by "Lanka Sathosa" last week, he said. Rice, onion, potatoes, pulses, vegetables, fruits, eggs, chicken and meet prices have dropped during the last months, the latest weekly Food Commodities Bulletin issued by the Hector Kobbekaduwa Agrarian Research and Training Institute - HKARTI - stated.