Baku, Azerbaijan, May 31
Trend:
Kyrgyz farmers provide the country with only three types of staple goods out of nine, Head of Macroeconomic Policy Department at the Kyrgyz Economy Ministry Nasirdin Shamshiev said at a press conference on May 31, Sputnik Kyrgyzstan reported.
"We are talking about dairy products, fruits and vegetables. Everything else we have to import from abroad. This creates certain difficulties. Surely, we all remember how the prices for Russian grain sharply jumped due to drought, which triggered a price increase in our country also," he said.
Shamshiev noted that 80 percent of vegetable oil on the shelves in the Kyrgyz market is imported. The country also fails to provide itself with meat and sugar.
Head of the Association of Suppliers, Manufacturers and Distributors of Kyrgyzstan Gulnara Uskenbaeva, in turn, said that the authorities do not aspire to meet the domestic producers halfway.
"We are obliged to enrich the flour, so it costs a little more than Kazakh flours. Naturally, people buy imported goods, while Kazakh flour mills supply the domestic market with enriched flour," she said.
She stressed that businessmen and the state should unite efforts to ensure food security.