The state-run Myanma Alinn newspaper reported Monday that the arrests for allegedly selling rice for prices ranging from 31 per cent to 70 per cent over official prices set by the Myanmar Rice Federation involved 62 suspects, 102 warehouses, 53 supermarkets and superstores, 25 mills and seven other shops in major cities.
The violations could bring prison terms of six months to three years in 11 cases, including Kasamatsu’s, and fines and tax payments for the others.
A World Bank report last month said nearly a third of people in Myanmar are living in poverty and the economy is about 10 per cent smaller than before the pandemic. The displacement of more than 3 million people from their homes by fighting has caused a major humanitarian crisis.
Meanwhile, the value of Myanmar’s currency, the kyat, has sunk and many businesses are struggling with the gap between the official currency exchange rate set by the central bank of 2,100 kyat to the dollar and the more widely used free market rate of about 4,500 to the dollar.
