Havana/“The markets are no longer going to look for rice, now you have to get into the Facebook groups to find it.” The reason, assures 14ymedio Martín, a 46 -year -old Camagüano, is the top of 155 pesos the pound that the local government imposed on February 7 to several foods, including national production rice. Since then, the key product of the Cuban diet is not found in the pallets and the authorities have begun to press the nut against merchants who refuse to offer it.
Camagüey authorities advanced to the measures announced Wednesday by the Prime Minister, Manuel Marreroon “the centralized regulation of maximum retail prices to the rice and national production beans.” However, it is clear that the order to be implacable with irregularities comes from central power. It is about “correct distortions”, the slogan that has characterized the economic debacle of recent years.
A Published article Wednesday in Forward It accounts for the situation in the province. The “panorama,” says the newspaper in reference to the insubordination of those who continued to sell the grain to 230 and up to 300 pesos La Libra, “forced the authorities to promote an open comprehensive confrontation with [el apoyo de] the inspection, supervision and control bodies, of the areas of transport, work and commerce, [además] of forces of the Ministry of Interior, at the main points of sale of agricultural products ”.
“The rice has disappeared below 200 pesos in the markets and now it is only in the black market from 250 pesos,”
As a consequence, “the rice has disappeared below 200 pesos in the markets and now it is only in the black market from 250 pesos. The majority imported from Mexico or Brazil in bags of one kilogram, ”confirms Martín, who says there are also those who sell it only for bags, who are around 25,000 pesos.
The hunting, “rigorous” and “systematic”, as described by the medium itself, made only three cooperatives last Tuesday sell rice in the hatibonic market “while other points of sale remained closed, without knowing the causes.”
However, according to the local newspaper article, inspections do not cease and the authorities have discovered, “for population information”, that many merchants hide the topic price to “force customers to pay what they intentionally ask for” .
On a visit of various media to the hatibonic, including Forwardjournalists saw how inspectors discovered a platform in which the guava pound was sold to 120 pesos instead of the 50 decreed days before. “Consequently, a fine of 8,000 pesos was applied to the offender,” says the newspaper.
In night hours there are also “traquimañas” to alter prices, he told Forward Rolando Canto Cabrera, market administrator. At that time, several people bought from the truckers some rice quintals – 20,000 pesos each -, to “sell them in Havana and Santiago behind the curtain at 500 or 600 pesos La Libra”.
The police detected the cases. Fines of 8,000 to 16,000 pesos were applied to the culprits, he says.
