Food Prices Across Syria Double In A Year: WFP

More than four million students in Syria confined at home due to the coronavirus will not resume classes this year but will advance to the next grade, government said

Food prices in war-torn Syria have doubled in the past year to record levels, largely due to the Lebanese financial crisis and the novel coronavirus, the World Food Programme said Monday.

“Over the past 12 months, the price of WFP’s reference food basket has on average increased by 107 percent across Syria,” the UN agency said.

It has hit “14 times the pre-crisis average and the highest ever recorded,” WFP spokeswoman Jessica Lawson told AFP.

Syria’s war has devastated the country’s economy since it started in 2011, plunging 80 percent of its people into poverty, according to the UN.

Last week, millions of Muslims across Syria started marking the fasting month of Ramadan, with many displaced from their homes and the large majority under lockdown to stem the novel coronavirus pandemic.

“The key factors for the increase in food prices over the past 12 months have been the Lebanese financial crisis and COVID-19,” Lawson said.

Syrians in government-held areas have over the past year had to contend with a fuel crisis, a plummeting Syrian pound on the black market and price hikes.