The government allowed the regions to control the prices of “important goods for the people”

Stabilization will not apply to those goods for which government price control has been introduced. According to the government, these measures will help maintain a stable market situation and make some products more accessible to citizens.

Previously, such agreements could only be concluded for certain categories of food products of particular importance: various types of meat, fish, milk, butter, sugar, eggs, salt, tea, etc.

This rule did not apply to the DPR and the LPR, nor to the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions, where the authorities, together with manufacturers, were able to stabilize prices for an unlimited list of products from April 26 last year.

The Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) presented a proposal in October this year to expand the powers of the regions to regulate prices. At the same time, the service noted that the changes should not affect the voluntary nature of business participation in such agreements, nor the procedure for their conclusion.

According to an RBC source, the corresponding initiative on the part of the FAS was the result of a request from the governor of the Kaliningrad region, Alexei Besprozvannykh: the head of the region noted the difficulties that arose with the import of goods to the region due to EU sanctions and logistical restrictions.

A study by Romir conducted in October-November of this year showed that the average price of a set of 35 food products in Russia is more than 4.3 thousand rubles. Experts also found that 39% of Russians spend 30-50% of their income on food, and 30% of the country’s residents are forced to spend “50% or more of their wallet” .