Local produce’s prices skyrocket

18 September 2007
Report: Soodh

MALE, September 18, 2007 (N. Velidhoo Community, News Service) -- As the fasting month of Ramadan begins counting its days, local produce’s prices have skyrocketed.

At a stall at the new Local Market in the capital Male, Abdul Hakeem from Fuvahmulah has been selling produce for the past 15 years brought and bought from his native island.

“It’s common for prices to go up every Ramadan,” says Hakeem. “In fact, I have encountered no year when prices remained at what anyone will perceive as normal prices.”

“It’s difficult to collect and purchase produce, and recently, prices in Fuvahmulah have also gone up. But this is something that the customer does not know,” he said.

Some of the kind of produce whose prices have gone up are watermelon, coconut, cabbage and chilli. Their prices are now ‘double’ what was pre-Ramadan.

A bunch of bananas now fetch Rf500; a banana being available for Rf3.

Another vender says that for some reason this Ramadan, locally produced bananas are available in short supply this time.

“Even those brought here are taken to resorts,” he said.

The price of a watermelon was between Rf6 to Rf8 per kg earlier but the price has now gone up to Rf10 per kg.

While many islands, other than the traditionally famous North Ari atoll Thoddoo have started cultivating watermelons on a longterm basis, it still cannot meet the local demand.

“Therefore, the price of watermelons remains high because we have failed to import the needed watermelons from abroad,” says Naseer Mohamed, who runs a convenience store in Male. “Last year, watermelons were imported in great numbers bringing the overall price of the fruit down.”

A visitor to the local market, however, expressed bafflement at what he called the “sudden fluctuation of prices at different times of the day.”

“On Thursday morning, I bought a cabbage leaf for the price of Rf3 but in the afternoon the price had gone up to seven Rufiya!” said Ahmed Rasheed.

People speculate as to why prices of local produce -- and even imported ones -- have skyrocketed these days. Some suspect selfish traders stocking up on goods unnecessarily to create a black market price for products. This belief stems mainly from the fact that the Maldives Ports Authority has recently gone to many lengths to publicise in the media its claim that enough food stocks have been imported to meet the required demands for Ramadan.

A local analyst however also blamed on “rural businessmen deliberately raising the price of their produce for Ramadan.”

“Then towards the end of the Ramadan, when the festival of Fitr Eid approaches, they will lower the prices like a clearance sale so that they can sell their whole stocks and make way home in time for Eid festivities,” commented a local economic analyst.

But a rural trader told Velidhoo Community a different story. “Most of our produce had been damaged during the freak storms we experienced at different times of this year. Our cucumber and chilli farms were particularly hard hit. And in some islands, the banana plantations were damaged,” he said.

Some local economic analysts say that the reason why local traders can still pitch local produce at high rates is because there is a perception among local customers that local produce will be fresh and healthy -- and perhaps because of a certain sense of patriotism.

VELIDHOO COMMUNITY
velidhoocommunity@gmail.com