Rising cost of food hits consumers' pockets

A reporter from Cyprus Today’s sister newspaper Kıbrıs visited the Lefkoşa Sunday market and found that many fruits and vegetables, including those used as the main ingredients of meals, cannot be bought for less than 10TL.

Among the more expensive vegetables were black-eyed beans (10-15TL per kilo), “yellow” beans (15TL), and mushrooms (20 TL).

It was a similar picture for fruit, with sultana grapes sold for 10 to 15TL per kg and black grapes sold for 15TL per kg. 

Cherries cost between 15 and 23TL per kg while black plums, peaches, local plums and bananas were sold from stalls starting at 10TL per kg. Watermelon was on sale for 4TL per kg, with a pack of 10 prickly pears sold for 10TL.

The price of lemons remains high, selling for 12 to 15TL per kg. Oranges were sold for 7TL per kg.

In addition to these, the price of cucumbers, which had reached 15TL per kg in the past weeks, has started to decrease. Cucumbers were sold between 5TL and 8TL per kg, while the price of tomatoes was between 4-5TL per kg.

Molehiya, one of the “indispensable and traditional tastes of our country”, was sold for 15TL per bundle in the market.

Open Marketers Association head Yenal Garabli said that the main reason for the high prices was the lack of “planned planting” based on public demand.

“If there was an agricultural plan and programme, and if the products were planted and harvested according to the people’s demand, the prices would not increase, they would decrease,” he said.

Giving the example of watermelon, he continued: “More watermelon was planted then needed in the first days. 

“Members of the public were buying three watermelons for 10TL. Today, its price is as high as 6TL. Now a person has to pay 60TL for  a 10-kilo watermelon.”

Mr Garabli noted that some wholesalers made their payments “while the product is still on the branch” in order to “secure the entire field”, then, when prices increased, they “brought the product to market at the price they wanted”.

Mr Garabli added that increases in the cost of diesel have increased the “input” costs of producers, which were then passed on to shoppers in the form of higher product prices.

He advised consumers to “shop around” for the best prices.

According to the official June inflation figures, released earlier this month by the Statistical Institute, food and non-alcoholic drinks prices rose by 1.16 per cent compared to the previous month and were 20.36 per cent higher compared to June 2020.

Lemons, white lettuce and cos lettuce saw the biggest monthly price increases in June of 188.59 per cent, 160.46 per cent and 159.11 per cent respectively.