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Prince Sunduzani, Business Reporter
SOME retailers in Bulawayo are selling cooking oil from a local manufacturer, United Refineries Limited at above 10 percent the maximum retail price set by the producer.

Recently, URL released the recommended maximum price schedule that retailers selling its cooking oil should charge pegging a 375 mililitre and 750ml bottles at $1 and $1.75 respectively while two litres was pegged at $3.90 and $10.60 for five litres.

As snap survey by Business Chronicle on Tuesday revealed that most major retailers had not heeded the recommended maximum retail price by URL.

For instance, a 375 ml of Roil cooking oil bottle was being sold at $1.25 while brands such as Sunshine and Roil were selling at $4.30 for two litres.

Consumers have expressed ire over the retailers’ unjustified behaviour questioning how they arrived at such unreasonable prices for locally produced products.

Over the past three months, Zimbabwe has been experiencing unjustified price hikes on a number of basic commodities with some unscrupulous businesses blaming the price increases on shortage of foreign currency.

Finance and Economic Planning Minister Patrick Chinamasa in the 2018 national budget pointed out that the generic price increases could stoke inflation.

Figures from the Zimbabwe National Statistics show that the country’s year-on-year inflation rate ended at 3.46 percent in 2017.

The Competition and Tariff Commission (CTC) has said it would investigate businesses that drive excessive pricing of commodities and threatened to take legal action on perpetrators.

It also condemned the rampant price distortions and excessive price hikes in the market saying the situation was creating unfair competition and prejudicing consumers.

The CTC has noted that some businesses were also colluding to charge uniform prices on certain products yet their production costs were different.

President Emmerson Mnangagwa has also warned businesses against profiteering, urging them to be considerate to consumers and desist from wantonly increasing prices.

Against this background, the Zanu-PF Politburo last week also set up an ad-hoc committee to deal with wanton price increases for basic commodities.

@PrinceNkosy102