The Ministry of Domestic Trade and Cost of Living has issued a notice to Gardenia Bakeries with regard to the increase in bread prices across its product range.
This is after the company announced that it had to raise prices due to an increase in raw materials and the weakening ringgit that makes importing goods more costly. The baker said 30 types of its bread will see a price increase from 1 October.
Deputy Minister Fuziah Salleh said the company had to respond to the notice, as part of its efforts to avoid unreasonable price increases that could burden the people. “Gardenia needs to respond to the notice within six days because we want to know all the costs involved, for example the price of flour used, transport costs, wholesale and retail. The entire supply chain needs to be explained,” he said.
Upon which the ministry will do a comprehensive calculation to determine whether the increase in the price of food items is rational or not. He said the KPDN could not prevent a company from raising the price of their goods, however, the actual price setting could still be controlled according to the Price Control and Anti-Profitability Act.
Gardenia KL previously confirmed that 30 of their products will experience a price increase of between 10 and 40 sen, after reviewing the prices of selected products; however, the prices of white bread, whole wheat bread, and Toast’em bread remain unchanged to ensure that the increase does not burden the majority of customers.
