Price of garri increases in Enugu markets

Prices of Cassava flakes, generally called ‘garri ’ has slightly increased in some major markets in Enugu.
Garri is a staple carbohydrate food on most Nigerian families’ table that can either be eaten with vegetables or drank with peanut, fried fish or meat as well as bean cake or moin moin.
A survey in some major markets in Enugu metropolis on Saturday revealed that the prices of white and yellow Garri increased by about 15 per cent.
Some traders interviewed attributed the price increase to the start of a new planting season of cassava by farmers in the state.
Mrs Eunice Nduakor, a garri seller at Akwata market, said that the price of a 4.5 litre-bucket of white garri which was sold at N280 had increased to N350.
Nduakor added that the yellow Garri, mostly consumed by people of the South East and Niger Delta area of Nigeria, was now sold at the cost of N400 as against the old price of N350.
She said: “For almost four months, I have been selling a measure of white Garri and yellow Garri for N280 and N350 respectively, but now as I am talking the price has gone up.’’
Mr Felix Onuh, another Garri dealer at New market, said that a bag of yellow Garri was now sold between N9,500 and N10,000 as against the previous price of N8,000, while the white, which was previously sold for N7,000, now goes for N8,500.
Chioma Eze, a buyer at the Garki market, said she believed the price of Garri would not be so prohibitive because many people have gone into cultivation of cassava even before the 2019 planting season.
Also, Mrs Uchechi Obi said that the increase in the price of foodstuffs at the beginning of a new planting season was normal because of lack of storage facilities to preserve commodities when in season.
Obi said that there was need to have storage facilities for foodstuffs like Garri to preserve them when in season and out of season.