Saudi Minister of Commerce Majid al-Qasabi revealed on Tuesday several plans to implement the directives of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to ensure abundance of goods, prevent price manipulation, and confront monopolistic practices in the local market.
He said that relevant teams carried out more than 640,000 operations during the past six months to monitor the prices of goods, adding that 27,000 violators were monitored against whom legal measures are being taken.
Qasabi made the remarks during a press conference in Riyadh on Tuesday to tackle the crisis of rising costs in the Kingdom.
He said a specialized committee, which includes 10 government agencies, holds periodic meetings to ensure the abundance of food stocks in the country and find alternatives to supply from around the world and new factories.
In case of a shortage of some products, Qasabi said the committee will intervene, in line with the state’s recent allocation of SAR10 billion ($2.6 billion) to support the stock of basic commodities and ensure their availability in the Saudi market.
He explained that the successive global crises, including the coronavirus pandemic, the increase in demand versus supply during the recovery phase, the suspension of navigation in the Suez Canal, and the Russian-Ukrainian crisis led to a six-fold increase in the cost of transportation and shipping.
These global crises have directly affected prices.
He added that during the recovery from the pandemic, prices of fuel and raw materials witnessed a significant hike that eventually led to a surge in the cost of transportation, shipping and product production and operation.
