ICCC to regulate prices of goods in Manus

EFFECTIVE price regulation of goods and services is needed to ensure affordability for consumers, Manus administrator Andrew Posong says.
He was at the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding with the Independent Consumer and Competition Commission.
“It is really the consumers that we are trying not to protect but assist in terms of like when you talk about resources,” he said.
“The majority of the people living on subsistence farming are coming into town where people are working. In a shop, there is one price for everybody.”
He said for people working, it was not that bad. But the unemployed are really struggling.
“When we don’t have that form of control, it hits them very hard” he said.
“At least some form of control will help in this.”
Posong said there were cases of varying prices of goods in the province, especially for fuel that consumers depended on.
“I wrote to the ICCC last year on concerns over the RPC (Regional Processing Centre). When the centre was established we came to realise that the prices shot up very quickly on the basic items such as rice, tinned fish, meat. It was very different from shop to shop.
“Within a month the ICCC came over to intervene. As a result of this, the MoU came about.