Minister: Prices will be stable

Minister: Prices will be stable At the same time, this official said, basic foodstuffs and agricultural produce will become cheaper. Meanwhile the government and experts are sending out messages that this year must see austerity and saving along with frozen public sector salaries. Although decreasing demands ought to bring the prices down, retails and companies that offer basic services are announcing price hikes. B92 spoke to Milosavljevic about this, and the Trade and Services Ministry's influence in the matter. B92: Which prices will go up in 2009, and which products will get cheaper? Milosavljevic: In the past couple of weeks, we have had the start of a decline in the prices of basic agricultural produce. It started with the milling industry and bakeries, that is, with flour, milk, and dairy products above all. I expect, bearing in mind that this year's corn harvest has entered the livestock fodder intensively, with wheat reaching the mills, that after New Year's holiday or in mid-January, early February, we'll have dairy products, pasta, confectionary, meat and meat products cheaper by some percentage. There are two preconditions for this to happen. First, the dinar's stability, or at least the stability within the expected framework, and second, that oil prices will remain on the same level in the months to come. Prognoses are saying that this will happen, and so does what I have at my disposal today. I can announce stable prices for the first quarter with a trend of cheaper basic foodstuffs and agricultural produce. B92: We spoke to milk and meat producers, and they are not as optimistic. They say that there will be no room for the prices to go down. What's your comment? Milosavljevic: It is makes complete sense that, when corn with a price of RSD 8.2, 8.3, for instance, enters the mass of beef, pork, chicken, this must bring down the prices. With lower energy prices, there is no input to production the cost of which is growing, and for the past two months, the prices of corn and wheat lower by some 40 percent compared to several months ago have been used. Only speculative reasons can not bring that price down. B92: What power does your ministry have to influence the prices as it talks to producers or retailers? Milosavljevic: Next year, we will take care about the prices of one type of bread, one type of milk, electric power and with this in one segment influence that the standard of living and purchasing power of Serbians is being preserved. Naturally, we will monitor the prices in the entire raw material chain, above all of the farming and food products, and will seek to encourage competition where possible, and if need be by intervening from our reserves of goods and with emergency imports, in order to use certain mechanisms to make those who keep their prices at an unjustifiably high level, or God forbid, raise them, accept the economic reality. B92: What is your message to the citizens, what should they save on, and what should they invest in? Milosavljevic: My message is to save, to fight to keep your jobs, and if possible invest in education, since that always brings some new value, and, choose. The differences in prices are really big from one store to another, from one moment to the next. Pay a little more attention to sales that are relatively new. We are not accustomed to monthly shopping of what's cheapest in one week, all retail chains, for example, offer sugar 30 or 40 percent cheaper in one week. I think that citizens of Serbia must inform themselves more through leaflets in the newspapers, and commercials on TV and radio, to project their budgets according to the offers made by producers and retailers. Slobodan Milosavljevic (FoNet, archive) Trade and Services Minister Slobodan Milosavljevic says prices in Serbia in Q1 of 2009 will be stable. Journalist: Ivana Pesic "My message is to save, to fight to keep your jobs, and if possible invest in education, since that always brings some new value, and, choose. The differences in prices are really big from one store to another, from one moment to the next."

Minister: Prices will be stable

At the same time, this official said, basic foodstuffs and agricultural produce will become cheaper.

Meanwhile the government and experts are sending out messages that this year must see austerity and saving along with frozen public sector salaries.

Although decreasing demands ought to bring the prices down, retails and companies that offer basic services are announcing price hikes.

B92 spoke to Milosavljević about this, and the Trade and Services Ministry's influence in the matter.

B92: Which prices will go up in 2009, and which products will get cheaper?

Milosavljević: In the past couple of weeks, we have had the start of a decline in the prices of basic agricultural produce. It started with the milling industry and bakeries, that is, with flour, milk, and dairy products above all. I expect, bearing in mind that this year's corn harvest has entered the livestock fodder intensively, with wheat reaching the mills, that after New Year's holiday or in mid-January, early February, we'll have dairy products, pasta, confectionary, meat and meat products cheaper by some percentage.

There are two preconditions for this to happen. First, the dinar's stability, or at least the stability within the expected framework, and second, that oil prices will remain on the same level in the months to come. Prognoses are saying that this will happen, and so does what I have at my disposal today.

I can announce stable prices for the first quarter with a trend of cheaper basic foodstuffs and agricultural produce.

B92: We spoke to milk and meat producers, and they are not as optimistic. They say that there will be no room for the prices to go down. What's your comment?

Milosavljević: It is makes complete sense that, when corn with a price of RSD 8.2, 8.3, for instance, enters the mass of beef, pork, chicken, this must bring down the prices. With lower energy prices, there is no input to production the cost of which is growing, and for the past two months, the prices of corn and wheat lower by some 40 percent compared to several months ago have been used. Only speculative reasons can not bring that price down.

B92: What power does your ministry have to influence the prices as it talks to producers or retailers?

Milosavljević: Next year, we will take care about the prices of one type of bread, one type of milk, electric power and with this in one segment influence that the standard of living and purchasing power of Serbians is being preserved.

Naturally, we will monitor the prices in the entire raw material chain, above all of the farming and food products, and will seek to encourage competition where possible, and if need be by intervening from our reserves of goods and with emergency imports, in order to use certain mechanisms to make those who keep their prices at an unjustifiably high level, or God forbid, raise them, accept the economic reality.

B92: What is your message to the citizens, what should they save on, and what should they invest in?

Milosavljević: My message is to save, to fight to keep your jobs, and if possible invest in education, since that always brings some new value, and, choose. The differences in prices are really big from one store to another, from one moment to the next. Pay a little more attention to sales that are relatively new.

We are not accustomed to monthly shopping of what's cheapest in one week, all retail chains, for example, offer sugar 30 or 40 percent cheaper in one week. I think that citizens of Serbia must inform themselves more through leaflets in the newspapers, and commercials on TV and radio, to project their budgets according to the offers made by producers and retailers.