Cost of living rising, says CfSC
Centre for Social Concern (CfSC) says households continue to struggle to access basic food and non-food items as prices of most basic needs continue to rise.
CfSC Basic Needs Basket shows that the cost of living or the cost of maintaining a certain standard of living, rose by about 14 percent in January.
The findings show that a family of six now needs K236 000 to survive in a month, a rise from K206 000 per month the year before.
CfSC programme officer for economic governance Bernard Mphepo said in an interview last week most Malawians are hardly surviving as incomes are not reflecting the living costs.
He said: “The figures reveal that many Malawians’ average levels of income fall below minimum requirements of cost of food items and minimum cost of living.
“The fact that the cost of living is significantly influenced by the general increase in both food and non-food items, reveals how government should be serious in putting up policies to protect the welfare of Malawians.”
CfSC believes that an increase in minimum wage, currently at K50 000 per month, will support the majority of Malawians to move out of poverty.
The faith-based organisation wants government to formulate a budget that will also cushion or embrace poor people in Malawi who form the majority of the population.
In an interview on Friday, Consumers Association of Malawi executive director John Kapito said consumers have been left with little breathing space as cost of living continues to rise.
He said: “The current situation is hard economically and socially. We do not know where this leads to, but one can predict tough times ahead.
“We would have loved to see the current budget building mechanisms on how to cushion the key sectors to provide a lot of stimulus support to the middle class and small businesses.”
Meanwhile, Malawi Energy Regulatory Authority (Mera) has hinted at a possible fuel hike, indicating that key factors that affect landed costs of petroleum products are the free on board prices of refined petroleum products on the international market and the exchange rate of the kwacha against the dollar.
In a statement issued last month, Mera said since the determination of the ruling pump prices in October 2021, the kwacha has slightly depreciated against the dollar by 0.12 percent, from an average of K823.49 to a dollar to the current average of K824.48 to the dollar
