High food prices in Syria make things difficult

While the government has worked extremely hard to combat inflation and dishonest speculation, the country’s food crisis has significantly worsened over the past few months, making life very difficult for the average Syrian.

The Syrian government has acknowledged the crisis and has affirmed that its officials will endeavour to fight off fraud and market speculators as to prevent over bloated inflation.

Already back in December, the World Food Programme said it was concerned about rising food insecurity in Syria, as violence affects supply lines and damages bakeries; and as people fleeing the violence increase demand in their areas of refuge.

Syria currently has enough wheat reserves for just a little over a year, according to the Ministry of Agriculture and Agrarian Reform, but should violence continue things will get much worse, much faster.

Sources in Syria have warned that certain unscrupulous individuals had sadly taken advantage of the situation by trying to capitalize on people’s desperation through corruption and food trafficking.

To deal with food shortages people had had to resort to alternative coping mechanism – skipping meals and so on – 

There is little independent data about the success of this year’s harvest, but the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) says there are several reasons to assume it was below average: rains were poor; insecurity prevented farmers from accessing their land; and a fuel and labour shortage led to some croplands not being harvested at all. In September, FAO forecast a production of 3.5 million tons of cereals in 2012, down from 4.7 million in 2011.

In addition, Syria normally relies on imports for almost half of its domestic food needs: FAO predicts it will need to import more than five million tons of cereals for food and animal feed between July 2012 and June 2013 - up more than a third from last year. According to media reports, sanctions have affected Syria’s ability to buy grain on the market, though allied countries are said to have increased trade with Syria to help fill the gap.

The government has not acknowledged a wheat shortage in the country.

Local media recently quoted Qadri Jamil, Syria’s deputy prime minister for economic affairs, as saying the country’s “bread crisis” was due to the shut-down of many mills - including 23 in the embattled northern city of Aleppo alone - and challenges transporting flour from one part of the country to another.
 
The country’s normal production of 8-9,000 tons of flour per day has been reduced by 40 percent, he said. It has exceptionally reached out to friendly countries because it may need to import as much as 100,000 tons of flour per month, he added.

Rebel groups and government officials have reportedly begun making deals to ensure people get the basics they need to survive. Last month, the civil revolutionary council in the northern town of Al-Bab and its surroundings announced on its Facebook page that it had signed an agreement with the governor of Aleppo to trade wheat stored in rebel-controlled silos for flour, fuel and heating oil from government areas.