bread prices to go up 7%The Bakers Association of Zambia (BAZ) has revealed that bread prices are expected to go up by about 7% due baking ingredients and flour prices which have gone up from k900 to k960.
Speaking in an exclusive interview with the Zambian Business Times – ZBT, BAZ Chairperson Aziz Kapdi confirmed that flour prices which is the main ingredient has now gone up following the high cost of doing business which is threatening the prices of the final product.
Kapdi lamented that bakeries are now being forced to sell bread to please and attract customers and not to make profit for the fear of losing customers.
He said whenever bakeries decide to increase the price of bread to meet the cost of flour and baking ingredients, the customer turnout decreases.
He has since appealed to the government to consider subsidizing or introducing a price ceiling on wheat flour.
“The current price of flour is k960 for a bag of 50kg they increased to k60 at a go. The cost of flour and all the major ingredients like yeast, salt and plastics have gone up. Bakeries are crying, they don’t know what to do. Whenever bakeries manage to try and increase the price, there are no customers. Customers are complaining. So we don’t know what to do.”
“We are asking government if they can put some subsidies in the bakery industry or have a standard price for flour just as they have done for mealie meal because we don’t know which direction to go at the moment. Bread is selling at k13 when a loaf should be k20 that’s when some bakeries will manage to make profit and to replace their equipment’s over time,” said Kapdi
