Not so long ago, the Russian government has strengthened measures to curb inflation in food in the country. The reason was the increase in inflation in the first half of the year. And according to August data, inflation rose even more. Prices for flour rose by 5.5%, for semolina - by 3.2%, for chicken meat - by 4%. This is quite noticeable, especially for people living below the poverty line. And there are about twenty million of them in Russia.
What are the causes of inflation in Russia? One of the first reasons is called global drought. Almost the whole world suffered from it. Many farms in the country suffered losses from drought, and are likely to need state subsidies. This year, the grain harvest amounted to 77 million tons, which is 15 million less than last year. This means that grain prices will rise, followed by bread and meat. And it is unlikely that the government will be able to contain the rise in food prices.
Although there are some oddities. The country will need only 65 million tons of grain for domestic needs. The rest will be exported. So, the grain shortage does not threaten the country. Just sell less abroad. Why then it comes to the shortage of grain? And the new crop would not have time to affect the price tags. Usually grain and bread are separated for several months, this year's crop has not yet reached the shelves.
The causes of inflation are unlikely to be in the global drought. And the products are not getting more expensive from this. Most likely, the matter is exclusively in our Russian reality. Firstly, in summer, tariffs for monopoly services were planned to be raised. This should have happened earlier, but the election hindered. Secondly, no one restrains the price of gasoline, which could not but hit the peasant farms, because transportation and storage must be paid today at the current tariffs for gasoline and energy.
And this is not all the causes of inflation today. An important component with a purely Russian origin is the monopolization of the food market in Russia. Worldwide, the food market is the most competitive with the most flexible prices. In our country, each market is a small monopoly that holds prices iron and unshakable. Of course, there is no smell of competition. There is a master of the market, and all prices are agreed with him. Putting less is more expensive.
Speaking of monopolization, one cannot miss the energy market, which sins the same. The government could tighten control in this area by administrative methods, but this could lead to a deficit in the energy market, which would entail a slowdown in economic growth .
Listing the causes of inflation, it is impossible not to recall the corruption component of each product. This is not so little. Some time ago, Transparency International experts examined the components of milk prices, a fairly popular and widely available product. It turned out that the price of milk bribes, kickbacks and other payments amount to 30%. Apparently, the rest of the products that we buy in this sense are not much different from milk.
There is a slightly different inflation, the reasons for which lie in the waste of budget funds. We decided to use most of the budget funds at the end of the year, when it is really difficult to use money. This cannot but have inflationary consequences. Now again, many programs and competitions have not received funding, but are expecting it in the second half of the year. This means that this year will not be an exception in terms of price increases.
Studying the causes of inflation, thus, we get a situation that seems somewhat paradoxical. Russia is a country exporting grain, but in the first half of the year, food products went up by 6%, while in Europe, where grain is imported on the contrary, prices rose 1.6%.