The meeting of the president, the vice president, David Choquehuanca, his ministers, and the leaders of social organizations held at the government headquarters, reached agreements, according to statements by intercultural president Vidal Gómez to the press, saying that “The decision of militarization has been supported; second, the coordination with the mayors and the governors for the control of profiteering and speculation; third, the social organizations and the Bolivian people must denounce the hoarding, the smuggling (…)”.
The Minister of Economy and Finance, Marcelo Montenegro, for his part, assured that until September of this year the Plurinational State registered an accumulated inflation of 5.5 percent, higher than the same period in 2023 (1.49%), and explained the causes: “We have an accumulated inflation as of September 2024 of 5.5 percent, a rate that we are watching very closely and we have to explain what components are behind it. We are ruling out this stagflation scenario.”
According to the minister, the climate crisis, the so-called reverse smuggling, imported inflation, roadblocks, conflicts in Europe and the Middle East, among other aspects on the national and international stage, impacted the prices of different products, including those of the family basket and hygiene products, such as rice, tomatoes, meats (chicken and cattle), along with other imported products such as toothpaste, shampoo, conditioners and detergents.
Montenegro explained that drought, frost and flooding affected production, and after these adversities, smugglers take Bolivian food, at cheaper prices, to neighboring countries to sell it at a higher price. He also said that this situation is a sign of the strength of the Productive Community-Based Economic Social Model applied by the national government. He also stressed that Bolivia has one of the lowest costs of living in the region, which means that the prices of products are higher in several economies in South America and in other parts of the world.
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