An unenviable fate is foreseen for Turkey: fantastic consumer price inflation of up to 90% may “cover” this country by the end of this year. Tourism, of course, is at risk, since the hotel and restaurant business is in the first ranks of the rating of industries that have risen in price the most. Such a forecast was provided by the Turkish newspaper Ahval.
“Consumer price inflation in Turkey may rise to 90% at the end of this year, thereby breaking the record since the crisis of the 1990s,” experts of the publication said, referring to data presented by the Dutch financial company ING Group. At the moment, inflation in the country reaches almost 80%, or rather 79.6%, having accelerated since June, they add.
“Going forward, we expect inflation to peak in the 85-90% range in October before falling to around 70% by the end of the year,” ING Turkey chief economist Muhammet Merken said in a report. He also noted that there is a risk that rates will be even higher — everything depends on “currency movements.”
The expert also recalled that the Turkish lira lost more than a quarter of its value this year, which led to an increase in the prices of imported goods and materials. And it comes amid a sharp global surge in inflation, fueled by higher energy prices and supply constraints, exacerbating the situation in Turkey.
As experts emphasize, the population of Turkey feels the economists’ explanations “on themselves” – and they suffer from a drop in their standard of living with rising prices. Istanbul, for example, reported a 99.1% increase in the cost of living in Turkey.
At the same time, let’s remind you that hotels and restaurants continue to remain in the top five sectors of the “national economy” that have risen in price the most in Turkey – such data were presented by the Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat), which published consumer and producer price indices for July.
Among the industries with the highest price growth in July, the hotel and restaurant business took the “bronze”, taking the third place in terms of the rate of price growth — by almost 2.5%. As for the areas with the largest increase in prices for the year, hotels and restaurants are in fifth place. They showed a 79.14% increase, and such rates of price growth are truly shocking. In the first place is transportation, which is no stranger to tourism, which showed an almost 120% increase in prices, also over the year the prices of food products increased by almost 95% and an important product for “all-inclusive” – alcoholic beverages – by 83%.