According to records in Hanoi, since March, many essential goods such as rice, pho, coffee, vegetables... have increased in price due to escalating input costs. Up to now, although gasoline and oil prices have decreased, retail prices generally remain at the old level.
Ms. Luc Thu Minh (Hoan Kiem ward, Hanoi) said that living expenses are higher than before, especially with convenient dining services such as vermicelli, pho, vermicelli increasing from 3,000 - 5,000 VND per serving. However, according to Ms. Minh, consumers also recorded positive signals from the State's gasoline and oil price management policy and expect the market to soon have more appropriate adjustments. "I hope prices will gradually stabilize again. No need to reduce deeply as before, just be more reasonable than now" - Ms. Minh shared.
On the business side, many business households said that maintaining prices in the past time is due to the pressure of costs not being reduced immediately.
According to Ms. Luong Thi Thuy - an employee of a food store, when gasoline prices increase, transportation costs and raw materials, especially seafood, at times increase sharply, forcing the store to adjust selling prices to maintain operations. "Currently, costs have gradually stabilized, if this trend continues, the store will calculate to adjust prices appropriately to retain customers" - Ms. Thuy said.
Similarly, in the transportation sector, many businesses are also gradually rebalancing their operations. Ms. Ha Thi Van - owner of Van Ha Luxury Car - said that the cooling down of gasoline prices is helping to reduce cost pressure, although businesses still need more time to recover. "We expect that when input costs are more stable, business operations will gradually improve, creating conditions to adjust prices more reasonably for customers" - Ms. Van shared.
Talking to Lao Dong Newspaper, Dr. Nguyen Minh Phong - former Head of Economic Research Department, Hanoi Institute for Socio-Economic Development Research - said that the impact of gasoline and oil prices on goods and services often has a certain delay. When prices increase, the market reacts faster; conversely, when prices decrease, it takes time for other costs to "absorb" and adjust.
Usually, it takes a certain period of time, about a month, for commodity prices to adjust to a downward trend" - Mr. Phong assessed.
This shows that the fact that prices have not decreased immediately is not unusual, but reflects the operating laws of the market. The important thing is that the general trend is positive, as input costs have been reduced. In particular, the policy of reducing gasoline and oil taxes to 0% is considered an important boost, helping to reduce production costs, increase liquidity and stimulate aggregate demand.
To make this process faster and more effective, experts believe that it is necessary to strengthen competition, price transparency and raise market awareness of both sellers and buyers.
As input costs continue to stabilize and the market operates more flexibly, it is expected that the price level of goods and services will soon "cool down", thereby contributing to consolidating purchasing power and supporting economic recovery momentum.
