You're reading: Crimean retailers jack up battery prices

SIMFEROPOL - Prices on certain goods in Crimea have shot up by 40% against the backdrop of the current blackout, regional leader Sergei Aksyonov has said.

“Shame on you! I discussed certain areas with the tax authority … In some cases, price hikes are as high as 40 per cent,” he told an inter-agency emergency response team on Friday evening.

He was responding to a claim by head of Yevpatoria’s administration, Andrei Filonov, who was speaking from his city, that local businessmen “have jacked up battery prices.

“Aksyonov asked prosecutors to sort out speculators.

For his part, Crimean speaker Vladimir Konstantinov suggested that parliamentarians of all levels make lists of entrepreneurs who are “making money from people’s misfortune” when the peninsula is in a state of emergency.

“They made themselves dirty, they will never clean themselves up anymore,” Konstantinov said.

In Simferopol, six days after Crimea’s energy blockade began, there is no sign of panic-buying of candles, torches and batteries, but these goods have become more expensive.

Candles are freely available in marketplaces and in shops, as well as from street vendors, an Interfax correspondent said. Many DIY shops have hand-written “Candles” signs displayed on windows. Candle prices have risen to around 25-40 rubles per piece.

Torches are freely available, too. Prices start from 50 rubles.Batteries sell for 55-57 rubles per piece (last week the price was five to seven rubles lower).

Low-capacity generators, which can be used in private properties and small shops, now cost 40,000-60,000 rubles in Crimea; an industrial generator costs at least 600,000 rubles.

Crimea depends on Ukraine for energy. Electricity can be supplied to the peninsula through four power lines in Ukraine’s Kherson region.

The peninsula can generate about 350 megawatts on its own; on average, it needs 1,000 megawatts.

Zero electricity flows from Ukraine to Crimea was registered in the early hours of November 22 after two power lines went out of order. Transmission towers under two other power lines were blown up on November 20. Crimea’s grid currently operates in an isolated mode. The region has introduced a state of emergency. Power suppliers have imposed rolling blackouts on consumers.

On November 27 the total limit amount was increased for the peninsula from its previous level on November 24 to 400 megawatts, including 310 megawatts for the Republic of Crimea and 90 megawatts for Sevastopol. This happened after a 50-megawatt-capaity power unit was repaired at a Simferopol thermal power plant.

The repair effort at one of the four power lines, Kakhovka-Titan, has been suspended.

Crimean leader Sergei Aksyonov is bracing for the worst-case scenario where the state of emergency could last almost a month until the launch of the first phase of an energy bridge from Russia’s Krasnodar Territory.