Sri Lanka’s two wheat flour millers have raised the price of a kilogram of flour by Rs. 17 with effect from Saturday, and canteen owners moved to pass the increase on to customers the same day.

Prima and Serendib both applied the Rs. 17 increase, Hiru News reported, with the companies saying it took effect from Saturday. Ada Derana carried the same figure. Neither outlet reported the new retail price of a kilogram of flour.

Update, August 30: the millers give a reason

A day after the increase took effect, representatives of the two milling companies attributed it to rising global costs — higher shipping and maritime insurance expenses, and increased international grain prices amid the ongoing Middle East conflict, Daily Mirror reported.

That is the first explanation either company has offered. Neither Prima Ceylon nor Serendib Flour Mills gave a reason when the increase was announced on Saturday, and neither has quantified how much of the Rs. 17 is attributable to freight, insurance or the grain price itself.

Food prices moved the same morning

The All Island Canteen Owners’ Association decided to raise the prices of flour-based foods — including roti, paratha and short eats — by Rs. 5, Hiru News reported separately. The association said the increase takes effect from midnight on Saturday, and that the decision followed the flour increase announced that morning. Its chairman, Harshana Rukshan, confirmed the Rs. 5 rise to Daily Mirror on Sunday, listing parata, egg roti, vegetable roti, rolls and patties among the affected items.

The increase is not uniform across the range. Ada Derana reported that alongside the Rs. 5 rise on paratha, egg roti and other flour-based short eats, the association set string hoppers up by Re. 1 and hoppers by Rs. 2 — smaller absolute increases on the two items with the lowest unit price.

The gap between the two announcements was a matter of hours, which is unusually fast pass-through for a food input in Sri Lanka. Bakery operators have in the past absorbed flour increases for a period before repricing.

Bread has not moved yet

The All-Island Bakery Owners’ Association has not repriced. Its Central Committee is due to meet on Monday to consider the flour increase, and association president N.K. Jayawardena said a decision on bread and other bakery products will be taken then, Ada Derana reported.

That leaves a two-day gap between the canteen sector, which repriced within hours, and the bakery sector, which has taken the matter to a committee. In April the bakery owners — named then as the All Ceylon Bakery Owners’ Association, and by Ada Derana on Saturday as the All-Island Bakery Owners’ Association — declined to reprice bread at all.

The size of the increase

Rs. 17 is more than three times the last miller increase LankaNewz recorded. Prima raised flour by Rs. 5 to Rs. 225 per kilogram on 29 April, citing higher transport costs after fuel price increases. On that occasion the All Ceylon Bakery Owners’ Association said bread and other bakery products would not be repriced despite the cost pressure — the opposite of the canteen owners’ response on Saturday.

Movement since April has been downward. Lanka Sathosa cut its retail wheat flour price by Rs. 10 to Rs. 159 per kilogram in mid-June as part of a nine-item reduction, in an exercise the Ministry of Trade has used through the year to pass falling import costs to consumers. The state retail chain’s price and the millers’ price are not directly comparable, but the direction of travel has now reversed.

Wheat is entirely imported, and flour carries heavy weight in household food budgets alongside rice — which is consistent with the millers’ explanation, given a day later, that freight, maritime insurance and world grain prices drove the revision. Neither company has linked it to the exchange rate.

Sources