Govt readies plans to enforce price labeling

The Saudi government is preparing to enforce its new policy of having price and quality labels on all products to counter price manipulation by crooked and greedy traders.
All businesses must comply with labels on all products, particularly basic commodities, by April 11 or face fines of up to SR 100,000. Repeat offenders will have their businesses closed for a year.
An official source told Arab News that those who do not comply would be held accountable. The aim was to tackle price manipulators.
Ahmad Al-Maaber, field supervisor and head of the commercial inspection committee at the Ministry of Trade and Industry, said this step was important for consumers. It will also allow the ministry to monitor price fluctuations. “The ministry will seek to unify prices while taking into account product quality and place of production. It will apply this measure in stages,” said Al-Maaber.
Al-Maaber said investors and merchants should not be upset by this decision, they should cooperate and help the ministry implement the initiative because ultimately they would benefit. Currently businesses are competing with each other by raising or reducing prices, he said. This also had a negative effect on consumers, he added.
He said it was important to have standardized price lists for products.
Abdullah Al-Ahmari, a businessman dealing in basic commodities, said this move will help eliminate price manipulation. He admitted that consumers were being exploited because of poor price controls.
However, he said producing standardized prices for products must take into account the bigger picture. For example, the prices of Korean goods are different from French imports and so on.
Prices, he said, should not be the only criteria. For instance, Chinese products are good and can compete with French products or even American ones, but the prices of products from France and America are more expensive because of the country of origin, high price of labor, and production costs. “So it will be unfair for merchandisers to use the price criteria as a sign of quality,” he added. Sultan Sharif, a food and beverage dealer, said he was waiting for this new measure, which he believes will create competition to provide the best quality products for consumers. He said the ministry has already launched the consumer goods indicator on its website, but this will be limited to those who use the Internet. In addition, the prices are in Arabic only, he added.