Government links teff price hike to shortage of supply in Addis Ababa due the blockage of checkpoints, sabotage by brokers and business people
borkena
It has been years since the cost of living in Ethiopia, especially in the capital Addis Ababa, became unbearable for millions of Ethiopians.
New reports seem to indicate that it is worsening. On Saturday, Ethiopian Media Services (EMS), U.S. based broadcaster, reported that the cost of a quintal of teff soared to an all-time high.
Within a month, a price difference of between 2500 to 3500 birr is reported. Before a month a quintal of teff was in anywhere between 5500-600 birr. Now it is selling for 9000 birr – according to EMS which cited residents from the city. In some places it is selling for up to 10,000 birr.
The price increase is also observed in other cereal crops as well.
“When there is a claim about production surplus, this level of price increase is unheard of. It is shocking. It seems like a ruling has been passed condemning the poor not to live,” that is what a woman whose name is undisclosed told EMS.
City Administration, through the deputy mayor Jantirar Asfaw, admitted that price hike is observed and he linked it to a shortage of supply to the city in the past two months. He reportedly said that brokers sabotaged cereal crops not making it to the market.
Blockage of checkpoints leading to the capital Addis Ababa by what he called “illegal entities, ” and the existence of merchants who are attempting to manipulate prices artificially by withholding cereals (including teff) instead of making them available to buyers are also indicated as contributing factors for the shortage.
The Ethiopian government has recently been making claims that it is starting to export wheat. The story has been regularly making headlines in government media outlets for several weeks.
Unbearable cost of living and price inflation has been an agenda item among government policymakers and the government has been vowing to act on them.
The government has been repeatedly linking the situation, partly, to economic sabotage. The city administration still seems to hold the view that, based on Jantirar’s remark, the economic sabotage is intended to create a sense of disenchantment among the people.
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“Price Control”
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US president Richard Nixon’s “Price Control” Executive Order 11615; (in 1971).
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Executive Order 11615—Providing for Stabilization of Prices, Rents, Wages, and Salaries
Source = presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/executive-order-11615-providing-for-stabilization-prices-rents-wages-and-salaries
Perhaps, the “leader” can do the same as what he was able to do (set-price) for the widely announced “wheat -export” scheme, a week or two ago…
–> Home-grown commodities should be price-controlled to prevent “middle-men” from holding the PUBLIC “hostage”. —> (“Enforcing law & order” must apply here too .)
There needs to be some kind of STANDARDs established to CLEAN-UP the market-place and liberate the consumer (the public at large) removing thieves & the “delala-mafia-groups’ out of the market-place.
Where farmer & consumers connect-directly, removing the middle-man, by implementing such tools like “Blockchain” to bring transparency and eliminate such things like “corruption”, theft, “bribe’ in government -services, & “price -gouging ” in the goods & services market-place, just to name a few.
Tools like “Blockchain(s)” are open-source, meaning they can be copied (“Forked’) and modified to meet one’s needs…
Be well.
According to book of Amhara historians, Empress taitu defeated Italian Army with just one arrow and later captured 100,000 italians with one stone . Menilik II had done miracles in the battle of Adowa. Only these two leaders wrote a remarkable history in the battle of Adowa.
Amhara region spilled honey and milk for centuries before the rule of TPLF.
There is often a “conceptual-deficit” in interpreting a form of expression or “saying (s)” literally…
1) “Milk & honey” is simply to depict the relative peace & harmony, and the uncomplicated “way of life”…
One can say in the last 27 years of TPLF rule the “leadership group” lived it up, (milk & honey) but that does not mean “milk & honey” was flowing in the whole of Tigray, quite the contrary, millions of Tigray population were in utter poverty… while the leadership-calls were popping Champaign, in Addis, Mekelle, Europe, Atlanta, Bangkok .
Heard of the famine in Borena, ,3 years in the making?
The ruling -class is doing very well, thank you!
That is how it works, its always the leadership and the talkative (jawar) that do very-well. (overnight millionaires).
Likewise, the larger population of Amhara did not participate in the excesses & comforts the leadership-class and those in the top echelon of power experienced for the longest time… but again the “milk & honey” is used to depict the relative calm, peace, & harmony enjoyed in their “pursuit of building a better life”… (no one chasing them and killing them for doing so…)
==> “Empress Taitu defeated the Italian Army with just one arrow and later captured 100,000 Italians with one stone .”
This is basically shortening the story…:
The Empress came up with the idea, instead of going face to face to fight with the large & well armed Italian army, she suggested they block the road to cut their access to “water”. As a result the Ethiopian army sounded the spring-water source and the Italians had no choice but to surrender. (after days without water, one can go without food for weeks, but cannot go without water for hours or day(s).. )
So, the portion you scribed is meant to depict the POWER of thought vs force (“strategic-thought”).
===> “Menilik II had done miracles in the battle of Adowa. ”
That is simply to express the “Art-of-war” , strategic execution of the war, using the enemy’s strength to work for you, for example:
(1) take their horses & donkey away (at night) so that the enemy cannot move its heavy equipment (guns) .
(2) block water access
(3) attack from the hill side while the enemy is in the ravine below (from both sides).
(4) Use the landscape to your advantage (as 3 above).
Etc.
The Menelik leadership & strategy was the reason the war ended to our advantage, even though the Italians had the best and advanced military equipment and trained-military.
That is what makes the victory of ADWA monumental in world history, where a not well equipped Ethiopian Arbegna defeated a well armed European power rather very easily, using a winning STRATEGY.
The amazing part of the story that is not talked about is, when the defeated-Italian-army, arrived home in Italy they were admiring Emperor Menelik (saying “Viva Menelik”), for treating them well after their were defeated. He gave them horses, donkey, to transport their troops and their wounded.
Unheard of in the worlds of war & defeat.
( Even in the current war in Ukraine, there are videos where Russian POWs are being shot & killed after they have surrendered…).
So, what Emperor Menelik has done, not only in Ethiopia history & the world, but for the defeated Italian-forces is “unique”, unheard of, & unusual in the history of wars; and saying that is not an exaggeration. It happened.
Be well.