As of today, 1 April, the price of natural gas in Bulgaria is up by… 30 percent, no joke there. However, Bulgaria is not the cause of this record-breaking price hike, Gazprom is. The Russian supplier meets 90 percent of this country’s gas demand.
We shall not be going into the reasons given by the Russian company for this staggering rise in gas prices in any detail here. What is more revealing is Bulgaria’s reaction and the effect this unprecedented price hike will have on businesses and the public.
In this country, gas is used mostly in industry, whereas household use of gas is still rudimentary. Nonetheless, any rise in its price will have a domino effect on the cost of central heating, electricity and many products in daily use, because gas is used in their manufacture. That the prices of these commodities and services will go up is inevitable, because the price of gas has a direct effect on their prices as well. These are staples like bread, milk, meat, fruit and vegetables. It is not as yet clear whether Bulgarian manufacturers will up the price of their products now, or whether they will wait and see how things turn out. One thing is clear, however, that prices will go up and that Bulgarian consumers are definitely not going to be happy about it - it is some years since the public have seen prices crawling up, because there has been a process of deflation in place in the country. What their reaction will be to the expected domino effect on prices, it is still too early to tell. In any case, the sorry plight of the man in the street, and most of all of the elderly on their meager pensions, can only get worse and people will cut down on consumption. That, in turn poses a direct threat to GDP growth, which has been moving along with the increase in consumption.
To these pessimistic estimates we should add one more fundamental commodity the price of which is going up – drinking water, which will, as of today cost 18 percent more in the capital city, Sofia with its population of two million. The cascading rise in prices is bound to trigger politically-tinted social reactions. Widespread discontent will only fuel the political instability in the top tiers of government which we shall be witnessing in the months following the snap parliamentary elections because they did not result in a clear-cut winner who could take the helm of the country independently. The dancing prices and the inevitable upcoming under-the-table dealings do not bode well for the future of Bulgarians who have already tightened their belts all they can.
English version: Milena Daynova
