Sugar gets up in Armenia

Yerevan shops have set up sugar prices by about 20% higher. Exporters attributed this rise to the growth of world sugar prices.

The price of a kilo of sugar in Yerevan has gone up from 350 to 430 drams (from 0.97 to 1.17 US dollars).

"The old contracts, which assumed less than one dollar per kilo, have expired; therefore, we had to conclude new ones, but the prices went up," said Samvel Alexanyan, who is also a Deputy of the National Assembly from the ruling Republican Party of Armenia.

According to Mr Alexanyan's forecast, the current price will hold for 4 months – the term, for which the currently imported batch of sugar will be enough; however he could not say about any price changes at the end of this period.

"Higher prices should have appeared earlier; in Georgia this spring 1 kg of sugar was worth 450-500 drams (1.22-1.37 US dollars). We had has supplies of sugar; now we are importing new and more expensive batches of sugar," said Sergo Karapetyan, the Minister of Agriculture.

According to Vaagn Khachatryan, an economy expert, the price increase was, first of all, the result of supporting monopolies. "Due to the policy of the government small and medium businesses are closed; and over time they'll be forgotten whatsoever. Today, the economy has no competition – only the monopoly and oligarchy," he said.