District to subsidise freight

BULOLO, where PNG’s first Covid-19 case had been detected, has taken strategic action to subsidise air freight of all essential store goods and supplies to reach shops in Morobe’s remote areas.
Bulolo MP Sam Basil announced that the initiative was to cut down inflated prices of store goods reaching 200 per cent in some cases as well as to ensure sufficient stock was maintained.
Basil, who is National Planning and Monitoring minister, said freighting of store goods, including other essentials into Garaina valley began last week and would continue throughout the state of emergency (SOE) period.
He said this intervention, using the district support grant, involved the chartering of a North Coast aviation (NCA) aircraft to service all businesses within the vicinity of airstrips in Asama, Garasa, Garaina, Bapi and Omora.
“I am asking all business owners to ensure that they take away the freight costs from the total costs of essential goods and supplies on the shelf price on all items transported through the Bulolo development authority freight subsidy programme,” Basil said.
“I want to assure Garaina businesses and people that for as long as the SOE is in force, the subsidy programme will also continue to be in force.
“People should start experiencing reduced costs of goods starting this week onwards and throughout the duration of the SOE period.”
Concerns were raised by business owners, including the communities from the valley when they noticed fewer flights and less cargo reaching them, especially store goods.
Freight charges has risen due to operators having to put up with the stringent clearance processes while social distancing also took its toll on air operators of taking fewer passengers than usual. This had caused shops to run out of supplies while costs of goods had risen by more than 200 per cent for those businesses that had to pay their own freight costs during the SOE period. Basil said he was also embarking on a similar arrangement at a larger scale through his department for other small to medium enterprises and on the return leg for farmers to sea-freight their produce to markets under the government’s freight subsidy.