Uncontrolled Inflation; MP: The Government is Incapable of Meeting Basic Needs of the People

While the Iran Chamber of Commerce announced the point inflation rate for June to be between 40 to 54 percent, and the Statistical Center of Iran confirmed over 70 percent inflation for food items, a member of the Islamic Consultative Assembly stated: "The government is incapable of meeting the basic needs of the people." Ahmad Alireza Beigi, a member of the Islamic Consultative Assembly, criticized the government's economic policies on July 6, saying: "The people are faced with a government that is incapable of meeting their basic needs and instead of focusing on its performance and accepting responsibility, it continuously enacts strict laws for the people." He emphasized: "In such conditions, people naturally rebel, do not comply with the enacted laws, and protest widely without regard to government statistics and claims." In this context, economist Ahmad Alavi, in the 'News Hour' program on Voice of America, questioned the accuracy of the statistics provided by government institutions regarding inflation, stating: "The Islamic Republic does not present accurate statistics and censors the numbers because these statistics do not align with the daily experiences of the people and are not accepted by them." He pointed out that the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic named the year 1402 as the 'Year of Controlling Inflation and Growing Production' and added: "A look at the actual economic developments and higher documents from previous years shows that every year the opposite of what Ali Khamenei named that year has occurred." According to this economist, the announced inflation rate in Iran is calculated by altering the basis of calculation, which fundamentally differs from reality, while the government also distorts and censors statistics to deceive the people. A few days ago, Gholamreza Mesbahi Moghadam, a member of the Expediency Discernment Council, said in an interview with Jamaran: "We do not have a satisfied population like the Chinese who are content with one or two meals a day." However, the newspaper Donya-e-Eqtesad, in a report examining Mesbahi Moghadam's claims, wrote: "Statistical investigations show that the Chinese not only do not eat less than Iranians, but their average calorie consumption is higher than that of the Iranian people." The newspaper emphasized: "The secret of China's economic development and increased welfare is not the behavior and number of meals of its people, but rather the correct policymaking of its officials, which has managed to lift about 800 million people out of absolute poverty." Investigations show that Iran is among the 10 countries with the highest nominal and real food inflation from March 2022 to March 2023. The Islamic Republic of Iran also ranks after Lebanon, Zimbabwe, and Argentina in terms of the highest food inflation, which stands at 73 percent.