Benguela — The Secretary of State for Industry and Commerce, Carlos de Carvalho Rodrigues, reaffirmed Thursday in this city that policies are being adopted to reduce the prices of the main products of the basic basket in the market.
The official, who is on a two-day working visit to Benguela, is x-raying the reality of local industries, with emphasis on production capacity, in addition to having a trip to the commune of Dombe Grande on the agenda.
According to Carlos Rodrigues, the Government has been adopting policies to promote national production with desirable effects, the results of which are already beginning to impact on the reduction of market prices.
The official said that the impact of these measures will be more effective from 2025.
The Secretary of State pointed out that the Ministry of Industry and Trade has been organizing, from the point of view of imports, some goods that are still necessary.
He referred to sugar, rice and fertilizers, whose import is now through inverted auctions with award criteria that excel at the lowest price.
In this way, Carlos Rodrigues explained, it was possible to reduce the price of sugar by around 30 percent, the same occurred with rice and recently with fertilizers.
Regarding the trip to Benguela, the official informed that they came to find out in loco what the Cart group has been doing both in the Industry and Commerce sectors.
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He reaffirmed that one of the Government's main objectives has to do with the diversification of the economy and food security, considering what they found in the Cart group to be encouraging, although it faces difficulties in terms of raw materials.
On the other hand, he said that the manufacturing industry still has many challenges, as it represents only 11.4 percent of non-oil GDP for 2023.
'There is still a long way to go, but the indicators are positive,' he emphasized.
As for the main difficulties of manufacturing industry operators, he pointed to the shortage of raw materials, a situation that has conditioned production capacity.
He said that the Government will continue to work and provide all necessary institutional support in order to reverse the current situation.
He informed that, recently, the Industry Portal was launched, whose objective is to collect statistical data from the sector.
In this way, he pointed out, the Ministry will be able to look at the industrial park and understand the variations in both the level of production and the installed production capacity, providing the necessary support for the industry to grow in a sustained way and properly integrated into the level of weight in the GDP. CRB/DOJ
