Amid soaring inflation, an official says that the Bank in Lithuania plans to analyse whether food price rises are justified by growing costs.
“This month, we will carry out a more detailed analysis of food price developments, the results of which we will present in February,” Aurelijus Dabusinskas, head of the Economy Department at the central bank, said.
“This analysis will seek to provide an economic assessment of the evolution of food commodity group prices – what has driven most of the price increases, to what extent we can explain them through historical relationships between these prices and their drivers and so on,” he added.
Statistics Lithuania estimated that annual inflation in the country stood at 20% in December 2022. Food prices alone rose by 36% over the year and, besides energy, had been the main driver of inflation.
Opposition MP Rasa Budbergyte has suggested that, following Sweden’s example, Lithuania should carry out an analysis to see if all price increases are justified by growing production costs.
Prime Minister Ingrida Simonyte has also hinted that the Bank of Lithuania could look into the matter.
According to Dabusinskas, the central bank habitually monitors price developments in the country and presents the findings to the public.
However, it cannot determine whether producers and retailers are engaging in price gouging.
“Our analysis will not seek to provide an assessment of the reasonableness or otherwise of the price level of individual food products, the acceptability or otherwise of the pricing of individual market participants, market structure, cartels and similar aspects,” he said. “Such assessments in the food market are not within the scope of the Bank of Lithuania’s supervision and analysis, and possible cartel agreements should be investigated by the relevant public authorities.” (LRT/Business World Magazine)