BEIRUT, June 27 (Xinhua) -- Some Lebanese on Saturday stood in queues outside bakeries to buy large quantities of bread, amid circulating news about a possible shortage in bread due to the weakening in local currency to the U.S. dollar.
Lebanon's bakery owners sell bread in Lebanese pounds but must pay in dollars to millers, who in turn, import wheat and flour from abroad.
The exchange rate of the U.S. dollar to the Lebanese pound has reached on Saturday an unprecedented level of 8,000 Lebanese pounds in the black market which reflects directly on the prices of food items in the market.
Ali Ibrahim, head of the Union of Bakeries Syndicates, announced on Saturday that bread would stop being distributed until a solution to bakeries' losses is found.
Mohammad Mansour, owner of a bakery, told Xinhua that mills have suddenly decided to stop providing bakeries with flour out of fear that the price of U.S. dollar witnesses further increase in the coming days which would cause millers to incur losses.
A big quantity of bakeries have shut their doors refusing to sell bread at the old price amid the weakening in the price of the Lebanese pound. Enditem
