North’s bread price rises again

The price of a loaf of bread in the north has been put back up to its historical high of 15TL (€0.44), the north’s Bakers’ association chairman Omer Cirali said on Friday.

The price rise will come into force on Saturday and could potentially put bakers at odds with the north’s ‘government’, which had intervened the last time bakers attempted to charge 15TL for a loaf of bread.

The ‘government’ had at the beginning of February attempted to decree a maximum price of 12TL (€0.36 at the time) for a loaf of bread, knocking 20 per cent off the 15TL retail price set by bakers.

However, they were met with collective resistance on the part of the bakers, who declared the decree to be in violation of the north’s laws on competition.

They said, “under the conditions of the bread and bakery competition law, each bakery has calculated its own costs and offered our products to people at affordable prices so far.”

“In this regard, we have determined each bakery’s own costs separately, taking into account the recent excessive price increases, under free market conditions,” they added.

Opposition party CTP ‘MP’ Devrim Barcin had said at the time it was “utterly delusional to expect compliance.”

Bakers demanded a meeting with ‘prime minister’ Unal Ustel, and the potential conflict was averted the following day when an agreement between them and the ‘economy ministry’ was reached.

‘Minister’ Olgun Amcaoglu announced that a loaf of bread would henceforth be sold for 13.50TL (€0.41 at the time, €0.40 today).