[Source: Google]

The reduction of customs duties on 1,600 items kicks in tomorrow, resulting in a reduction of prices for certain essential items.

Minister for Economy Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum says the custom duty reduction applies to alcohol, exercise books, footwear, sweet biscuits, cereal, toothpaste, pastries, and certain clothing items; stressing the need for this to trickle down to consumers.

Sayed-Khaiyum says people should demand these changes from retailers.

“From the 1st August, all of this is effective. Essentially what we said we want it to be passed on to the consumers. As you know, we want the market to compete with each other. All we are saying to them is to please reflect the price reduction because of the fact that duty has actually decreased too. That’s critically important for us.”

Fijian Competition and Consumer Commission Chief Executive Joel Abraham says will ensure retailers abide by the new changes.

“We’ve been having meetings since the announcement that was made on the 17th of July with different businesses to understand how their inventory levels are and how they are going to pass on the duty reduction and tariff reduction as well.”

The government says Fijians should be able to benefit from the import duty rate changes on items such as imported vegetables, canned foods, milk, and certain textile materials amongst many others.