Fijian Competition and Consumer Commission (FCCC) chief executive officer Joel Abraham has issued a stern warning to retailers and wholesalers who “unethically” raised the price of chicken before and after the announcement of the 2023-2024 National Budget.
He said FCCC would monitor these retailers on a day-to-day basis and if the exorbitant prices were not reduced, FCCC would impose price restriction and charge the relevant traders for unconscionable conduct.
“The concern we’ve received from members of the public was the exorbitant prices of chicken, namely we saw the two brands that are there in the market, Rooster and Crest Chicken, there are a lot of photos being posted around social media and we saw some prices went up to $33,” Mr Abraham said.
“What FCCC has done is we’ve got into contact with both the wholesalers and the retailers. Under no circumstances, we’ve said to them, that they cannot unethically raise the price.
“We’ve confirmed that these price rises may be isolated to a few stores.
“We have under no uncertain terms, informed the stakeholders that if they don’t correct their practices, FCCC will not think twice about imposing price regulation in this, meaning that we will move to price control this.
“As of today, our officers have been monitoring the situation. “From yesterday, we have already started seeing price reductions.
“We are hoping from today, tomorrow and going into the weekend, the prices are going to come down and this should only be reflective of the changes in VAT (value added tax) and any other cost adjustments that are legitimate in nature.”
He said any price increase for items not price controlled should only increase by 1.06 per cent.
“If you suspect that somebody has jacked up the price, if you go shopping from one week to the other and you see that the price has increased drastically, please let us know.
“Usually, it should be whatever the old price was times 1.06 per cent is what the change in VAT should yield.
“If the price is higher, report the matter to us. It will also be useful instead of venting on your own social media pages or posting on these chat forums. FCCC is also on Facebook.”
Mr Abraham said providing detailed information to FCCC would help them isolate, investigate and take the people who were behaving unethically to task.
He said the commission would ask the courts for the highest penalty in the FCCC Act of 2010 to be laid against retailers and wholesalers found exploiting “consuming vulnerabilities”.
