Istanbul Chamber of Bakers Board of Directors held its regular monthly meeting for October. Rising flour prices and energy costs were discussed in the board. The increased input costs were requested to be reflected on bread prices.
The problems of the bakers marked the October board meeting of the Istanbul Chamber of Bakers. In the statement made by the chamber, it was noted that current professional issues were discussed at the regular Board of Directors meeting for October, and the following information was given: “Flour prices, energy costs and the lack of qualified personnel in the bakeries, which are among our uninterrupted and constantly increasing cost items. It was agreed that it became mandatory to reflect these costs to our production and that the demands of our tradesmen should be notified to the relevant institutions at once.”
On the other hand, Chairman of the Istanbul Chamber of Bakers, Erdogan Cetin, said the following: “Our bakers are at the forefront of the business lines that have been affected the most by the economic conditions we have been in in recent months. We all know how many times our energy, labor, electricity and all inputs, especially flour prices and raw materials, have increased. It is impossible not to know this anymore and to say the opposite. In addition to many problems of our bakers, the excessive increase in our costs is the first priority. The production capacities of our bakers in Istanbul are decreasing day by day.
Although dealer profit rates in bread are determined by the legal framework; unfortunately, it is not implemented in practice, since adequate inspections are not carried out by authorized institutions. To ignore these problems now is to ignore a large industry that employs 300,000 people, including its employees.