Beirute – Supermarkets in Lebanon started pricing items in US dollars on Wednesday instead of the nose-diving local currency, after a government announcement allowing the practice in a country heavily reliant on imports.<\/p>\n
Since late 2019, Lebanon has been facing a dramatic economic crisis that has seen poverty rates climb to reach more than 80 percent of the population, according to the United Nations.<\/p>\n
The local currency, now officially pegged at 15,000 to the greenback, was trading Wednesday at almost 90,000 to the dollar, compared to 60,000 in late January.<\/p>\n
An AFP photographer said a large supermarket chain in Beirut had begun displaying prices in dollars on Wednesday, while the exchange rate of 89,000 pounds was displayed on a screen at the entrance.<\/p>\n
Domestically produced fruit and vegetables were still priced in the local currency.<\/p>\n
“Every week, or every day even, products are becoming more and more expensive,” said Susane Zeitoun, 28, who was shopping at the supermarket.<\/p>\n
“Now I have to calculate prices into Lebanese pounds,” she added.<\/p>\n
In February, Economy Minister Amin Salaam announced that supermarkets would be able to start pricing items in dollars, while customers could pay in dollars or Lebanese pounds at the volatile market rate.<\/p>\n
Each store would have to clearly announce the exchange rate it was using each day, he had added.<\/p>\n
Since the start of the crisis, stores had begun to adjust their prices in pounds, sometimes daily, to keep up with the fluctuating exchange rate — or at times pushing prices higher.<\/p>\n
Some restaurants and clothing shops had already begun to display prices in dollars in recent months.<\/p>\n
Shopper Sarah Rida, 37, said that “pricing items in US dollars is better”.<\/p>\n
“If a product is priced at $2, we can be sure that it will stay the same and will not increase or decrease in price from one day to the next.”<\/p>\n
Lebanon is being run by a caretaker government and is also without a president, as lawmakers have repeatedly failed to elect a successor to Michel Aoun, whose mandate expired at the end of October.<\/p>\n
Authorities announced in late February that customs charges would be tripled, a move that risks pushing prices up further.<\/p>\n
The World Bank has said that Lebanon food price inflation reached 332 percent year on year in June 2022, the worst in the world.<\/p>\n
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