KUALA LUMPUR: The Federation of Chinese Associations Malaysia (Huazong) has urged the government to step up effort to ensure sufficient supply of essential goods in the market during the Movement Control Order (MCO) period, besides stabilising their prices.
Its president, Tan Sri T.C Goh noted that following the implementation of the MCO to contain Covid-19 transmission, it has disrupted the logistics sector hence the supply of consumer items, and inevitably contributing to temporary shortage of some consumer goods and slight increase in their prices, in certain areas in the country.
“The government and the relevant authorities should pay serious attention to this matter and take necessary measures to remedy it as, if left unchecked, it would inflict more sufferings to the people who are currently struggling to cope with the devastating impacts of Covid-19 crisis and MCO,” he urged this in a statement issued today.
He noted that due to the MCO restriction, a certain manufacturing sectors are currently still non-operational and are unable to produce and supply their products to the retailers thus contributing to supply shortage in the market.
Besides this, MCO had also disrupted the supply of daily essential items including vegetables and seafood in some areas, and the affected markets were forced to either shorten their business hours, or to temporary cease operations.
Goh said, Huazong has been receiving feedback from its member associations and businesses in various states, expressing their concern over the volatility of consumer goods prices, largely due to the abovementioned factors. They thus hoped the government and the relevant authorities could act accordingly to remedy the issue.
“The government has in fact assured us that there will be sufficient supply of food during the MCO period. Similarly, the suppliers too have promised to give their full cooperation in this regard. Hence, if we could further enhance cooperation in the logistics sector, we should be able to resolve this issue of volatile consumer goods prices in the affected areas,” he said.
He then said, based on the feedback gathered from various quarters, Huazong has made the following proposals for the government to deal with the said issues.
1. Government to come out with a feasible Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) to facilitate the reopening of the manufacturing and logistics sectors in stages, so that the supply of essential consumer items in the market can be normalized.
2. Government to temporary suspend the Sales and Services Tax (SST) until end of the year, so as to help ease the manufacturers’ cash-flow problem in importing the raw materials.
3. Government should allow government departments and agencies which are not dealing with big number of people on daily basis, especially those under the Ministry of Finance (MOF), which are dealing with stamp duty and capital gains tax, to reopen with proper SOP, so that they could continue to provide the much-needed services to the people.-pr/BNN
