The cost of living in our country is constantly rising. The trade union consumer basket reached the amount of almost 3,000 BAM, and a new increase in fuel prices followed. It raised the old questions: is a new increase in food prices to follow? And while citizens fear, manufacturers threaten protests. The authorities are silent.
Buying food or medicine – has become an everyday issue for most of Bosnia and Herzegovina. citizens, especially those of the third age. Incomes miserable, prices at their peak. Often even higher than in some countries of the European Union. Merchants count their profits, citizens count change in their wallets and calculate what to give up today, looking for a formula for survival. And politics is promising. And it doesn’t fulfill.
“We are the only country that has the same VAT for everything, from muffins to Mercedes. It’s nowhere to be found. If necessary, let them copy from neighboring countries. Of course, it is immediately said that there is no political will. Of course, every increase that happens, e.g. fuel, does not immediately increase prices in our country”, points out Jovan Vasilić, president of the consumer association “Zvono”.
The real impact, economists point out, is yet to come, given the announced increase in electricity prices, which, they say, could cause major disruptions in the market. Bakers, at least it has been shown so far, are the first on the list of those who raise the prices of their products. If it’s any consolation, there won’t be an increase in prices, at least not until September.
“We have supplies of flour and fuel, so we will survive somehow, our customers don’t have to worry about this company, and we don’t know how our colleagues, our competition, will react,” says the owner of the bakery industry, Njego Zagorac.
“The prices are unrealistic” – say the producers, who were offered a purchase price of 36 pfennigs for a kilogram of “golden grain” this year. They demand a reduction in the price of bread and a meeting with the authorities.
“It is not normal that we buy 8 kg of bread for 100 kg of wheat for 36 pfennigs, that is 20 loaves of 400 grams each. That has never been and never will be, but you can see for yourself what the situation is and we cannot survive in this way. If that meeting or some concrete solutions are not reached, we, the farmers, will go out into the streets”, says Savo Bakajlić, president of the Association of Agricultural Associations of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Economists warn that the constant rise in prices is pushing our country deeper and deeper into poverty, and the threat of social unrest is also growing. Devastating data show that according to the annual poverty index in the analysis of 157 countries, Bosnia and Herzegovina took 18th place, Federalna writes.
