Lukashenko: From January 1, Belarus must have a clear, understandable system of price regulation

Belarus must have a clear, understandable system for price regulation starting January 1. This was stated by the President of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, at a meeting on improving the price regulation and control system, as reported by a BELTA correspondent.

"There is one goal, which I warned the government about: no producers, businessmen, traders, or service providers should run to the Ministry of Antimonopoly Regulation and Trade (MART), to ministries, or to the government. They should not run there to get prices approved. Starting January 1, there must be a clear, understandable system," the Belarusian leader stated.

Alexander Lukashenko explained with a specific example: "Here you have a 3% annual increase for certain groups of goods or overall. And that's it. A percentage in the first quarter, in the second, in the third... And in the fourth, a deflation of 0.1%. And people will understand how to structure their pricing. There must be a clear, understandable system."

The President instructed the government to revisit this issue and emphasized that the Ministry of Antimonopoly Regulation and Trade should not be involved in approving all these prices. "Listen, how many people will need to be kept at MART for them to oversee and approve all this? Go back to this issue in the government and assign tasks to everyone. From controllers, deputies to the prime minister. If you need me involved, please do. But the issue must be resolved," he demanded.

The Head of State noted that in Belarus, partly due to the measures taken to regulate pricing, inflation has significantly decreased this year. At the same time, skeptics previously claimed that such measures could lead to the withdrawal of several players from the market, but the situation is absolutely normal.

"Our inflation is, perhaps, 5-6%. We agreed to stay within 6%. But no more than 7%. But it was 19%! And everyone said: you can't. They wrote that people would leave, that there would be no one to trade. We have people to trade. And if someone doesn't want to live in Belarus like a human being – the road is open both ways," the Belarusian leader summarized.

Source: belta.by