Pasta consumption in Iran drops by 30 percent after flour price liberalization

The advisor to the board of directors of the Pasta Factory Employers' Association says that after the jump in flour prices, the price of pasta also increased, which resulted in both the domestic consumption of this product decreasing by one-third and the loss of its foreign markets.

Rasoul Mozhdeh Shafaq added on Monday, July 4: The government increased the price of wheat for the trade and industry by about 440 percent, and since the share of wheat in the price of pasta is more than 70 percent, the price of pasta eventually rose from 12,200 tomans per kilo to 34,000 tomans per kilo, and producers also went along with this economic reform of the government against their will.

In May of this year, the Ebrahim Raisi government eliminated subsidies for some food items, including flour, and the price of wheat for both the commercial and industrial sectors soared from 2,700 tomans per kilogram to 12,000 tomans per kilogram.

This is while the price of wheat on world markets has only increased by 50 to 60 percent since Russia's military invasion of Ukraine.

Iran's industry consumes 1.5 to 2 million tons of flour annually, which is equivalent to about 15 percent of the country's total flour consumption.

Mr. Mozhdeh Shafaq says that the cost price of Iranian pasta products is currently higher than that of foreign competitors, including Turkey; also, circumventing sanctions and imposing higher transportation costs during the sanctions period caused us to lose many of our markets, including Africa.

Source: Radio Farda