{"id":23955,"date":"2016-03-17T01:28:20","date_gmt":"2016-03-17T01:28:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/s-sudan-feels-pinch-of-economic-crisis-as-prices\/"},"modified":"2016-03-17T01:28:08","modified_gmt":"2016-03-17T01:28:08","slug":"s-sudan-feels-pinch-of-economic-crisis-as-prices","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/s-sudan-feels-pinch-of-economic-crisis-as-prices\/","title":{"rendered":"S. Sudan feels pinch of economic crisis as prices of goods shoot up"},"content":{"rendered":"

{South Sudan finds itself in a severe economic meltdown, after it devalued its currency last December in an effort to stabilise the prices of food commodities.}<\/p>\n

Joice Yiki, who sells beans at Juba\u2019s Konyokonyo main market, has considered closing down her business due to the high dollar exchange rates.<\/p>\n

Raising sufficient hard currency to buy imports from Uganda remains a big challenge for her.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I exhaust my current stock, I will go home and rest because I have no choice, since I purchase the beans from Kampala, Uganda,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Most of the goods sold in the South Sudan capital are imported from neighbouring Uganda, Kenya and Sudan.<\/p>\n

A 12kg bag of beans currently costs SSP450, compared with SSP70 before the local currency took a beating.<\/p>\n

A 50kg of flour now goes for SSP800, compared with SSP75 previously.<\/p>\n

The official exchange rate stood at $100 for SSP295, at the Central Bank and $100 for SSP360 at the commercial banks. The black market sold $100 for SSP400, the rate Ms Yiki said was preferred by ordinary citizens like herself.<\/p>\n

\u201cImagine! What is the rate of the dollar against the pound today?<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is very worrying and hurting to exchange $100 for SSP3,200 at the Central Bank and SSP3,600-4,000 per $100 on the black market,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

ARMS PURCHASE<\/p>\n

According to Catholic Bishop Santo Laku Pio, prices of good started rising steeply when the government decided to use billions of its reserves to buy arms, especially from China.<\/p>\n

Bishop Pio said the government\u2019s move was a \u201cgreat sin\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe problem is the cost of living caused by this erratic exchange rate. Everything is going up daily.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf the dollar goes up today, you are forced to raise your prices and the cost of food goes up,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n

According to a 2014 UNDP report, the socio-political and economic situation in South Sudan took a severe knock with the eruption of violence in December 2013.<\/p>\n

The report said the turn of events had reversed the significant gains in peace and security achieved since independence in 2011.<\/p>\n

The economy, the UNDP report explained, deteriorated with inflationary pressure, commodity price swings, exchange rate volatility and increasing domestic debt.<\/p>\n

SECURITY SPENDING<\/p>\n

Foreign exchange reserves were reportedly largely depleted and the budget ran large deficits owing, among other things, to heavy spending on the security sector.<\/p>\n

According to the report, the conflict in South Sudan had caused significant declines in domestic and oil revenues, limiting the budget allocation to human development initiatives.<\/p>\n

The government was reportedly facing budgetary constraints, forcing it to resort to printing money after it devalued its currency last year.<\/p>\n

Last week, Community Empowerment for Progress Organisation Executive Director Edmund Yakani said the decision to devalue the South Sudanese pound could be defended but its timing was realistic.<\/p>\n

Mr Yakani explained that the current state of the South Sudan economy offered nothing to the local market that could justify the devaluation.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis idea has been tried in other parts of the world, but with limited success. The manner we executed our devaluation cannot give us any success,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\"South<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

{South Sudan finds itself in a severe economic meltdown, after it devalued its currency last December in an effort to stabilise the prices of food commodities.} Joice Yiki, who sells beans at Juba\u2019s Konyokonyo main market, has considered closing down her business due to the high dollar exchange rates. Raising sufficient hard currency to buy […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[100],"byline":[2461],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-23955","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economy","tag-africa","byline-daily-nation"],"bylines":[{"id":2461,"name":"Daily Nation","slug":"daily-nation","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"contributors":[{"id":2461,"name":"Daily Nation","slug":"daily-nation","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23955","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23955"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23955\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23955"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23955"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23955"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=23955"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=23955"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}