The milling industry of the Dominican Republic generates more than 20,000 direct and indirect jobs in the country, according to the Dominican Association of Industrial Wheat Millers (Adoimt).
Adoimt offered the data by pointing out that the subsidies granted by the government to this sector make the Dominican Republic maintain more competitive prices for bakery flours from Latin America.
He explains that various world events such as the container crisis and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have generated an exponential increase in raw materials, with the highest prices in history, even higher than the 2008 crisis, with global reach.
Through a statement, Adoimt executives point out that, in particular, the war has had a strong impact on oil and wheat prices. Oil continues to show strong volatility in its price.
In the case of wheat, it reached its historical maximum this 2022, with prices of 1,209 per bushel, which represents an increase of almost 46 percent compared to last year.
“Faced with the challenges of rising prices worldwide, the Dominican government and industry are facing them with subsidies to have competitive prices, in order to guarantee supply to the national market,” the statement said.
They explain that, “thanks to this joint work”, the Dominican Republic currently has the most competitive price for bread-making flours, taking the Caribbean region as a reference, which has a price variation percentage of 22 percent, while the variation in the Dominican Republic is only one percent.
On May 24, during a press conference from the National Palace led by Vice President Raquel Peña, the Minister of Industry, Commerce and MSMEs (MICM), Víctor -Ito- Bisono, announced together with the Minister of Agriculture, Limbert Cruz, and representatives of productive sectors of the country that the government formalized new agreements to subsidize chicken production with 700 million pesos and 533 million more for flour production.
“I am pleased to announce the six-month extension of the agreement signed between our government and the Dominican Association of Wheat Millers, for an amount of 533 million pesos, since since he assumed this management in 2020 to date, he has had a relative variation of 66%”, he indicated.
He specified in that act, that the objective of this subsidy is to shovel the eventual increases that could occur in the breads and pasta as a consequence of the international instability of the prices of the wheat flour.
