Bakers alert on planned hike in flour price

There are indications that there could be another hike in the price of flour, bakers associations in Lagos have said.

Daily Trust had reported on Monday, the arbitrary increase in the price of flour by over 19 per cent between March and June this year.

Some bread makers who confirmed the latest plan to increase the commodity price, said they are at the development, lamenting they are currently at the mercy of millers who have been arbitrarily increasing their prices without recourse to the bread makers.

The development they said, had run many bakers out of business while the few of them still operating run on “negative”.

President of Premium Bread Makers Association of Nigeria (PBAN), Tosan Jemide, said from March 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic hit the country, the millers had increased prices for the sixth time.

He said if the bread makers wanted to follow suit in arbitrarily increasing prices, a loaf of bread would be selling for N800.

“Our businesses are crumbling. We bakers are just unfortunate because we are sandwiched in the middle. It is not only flour, the same thing with other ingredients – margarine, sugar, all our ingredients have dollarized components,” he said.

The spokesman of PBAN, Engr. Onuorah Emmanuel, said, “They are increasing the price of flour as from tomorrow (today). We are now in the negative. People think there is so much money in baking but that is not true.”

President, Master Bakers’ Association of Nigeria (MBAN), Alhaji Raji  Omotunde said: “While the millers have always complained about foreign exchange the government should sit them down and iron out what the problem is, stressing that government should come up with methodology to manage the crisis.”