By Anbarasan.
The news is from Srilanka.
The image caption is.
Ms Dilrukshi cooks on her porch to avoid smoke in the house.
"Cooking gas cylinder prices have almost doubled and we can't afford it anymore," says Niluka Dilrukshi. The 31 year-old mother of four has always cooked with gas to prepare food for her family, but now says firewood is her only option.
I used to give my children fish and vegetables daily. She says they are giving them one vegetable with rice. We used to have three meals a day, now we can only afford two.
Mrs Dilrukshi and her family live in a suburb of Sri Lanka. The husband is a day-wage labourer and the soaring cost of essential items means they are struggling to make ends meet.
The price of a standard cooking gas cylinder has increased by 85% over the past four months.
The island nation of Sri Lanka is facing an economic crisis. The foreign exchange reserves were only enough to cover a few weeks of imports.
The government has been forced to restrict the import of several essential commodities in order to keep its dollar reserves. Milk powder and rice prices have gone up a lot because of this move and increasing fuel and freight costs.
It's not just a problem for Sri Lanka, because of the sharp rise in living costs. People across the world are having to tighten their belts because of soaring inflation, which is being felt in several Asian nations, such as India and Pakistan.
The situation is particularly bad in Sri Lanka, a small island nation that is very dependent on overseas imports to feed its population. The country's tiny dairy industry can't meet local demand so it imports powdered milk.
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Sri Lanka is dependent on imports to feed its population.
Many shop owners in the main vegetable market in Colombo are selling a lot of greens. Many shoppers complain about the prices and are bargaining hard to get a better price.
We can only survive for two weeks with our current monthly salary. There is no hope for the future. Rice prices have gone up. One of the shoppers said there was a long queue outside the shops.
The food prices in Sri Lanka increased by a record 21.1% last month on a year-on-year basis, with several essential food items in high demand.
The owners' association decided to stop selling milk tea after seeing the price of milk powder go up. Milk tea will only be offered at a higher price.
Sri Lanka is sensitive to food price inflation. There has been a lot of negative sentiment regarding the constraints that we are seeing. If this level of price increases continues, it is likely to be close to a point of lack of tolerance.
Sri Lanka needs to find $6 billion this year for debt servicing, as its external debts are estimated to be more than $45 billion. Pakistan and theMaldives are also thought to be suffering.
The rising global fuel costs and the Pandemic have added to the problems of Sri Lanka. The country's biggest revenue earner, tourism, has taken a huge hit due to the Pandemic.
The number of tourists to Sri Lanka dropped by around 90% due to the Pandemic.
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Tourists were very fond of the Pettah Markets in Srilanka.
The government has limited options.
Due to the Pandemic situation, the pressure on our current account as well as our trade deficit was increasing. "We need to manage it as a responsible government," Shehan Semasinghe, a Sri Lankan minister tells the BBC.
The opposition has held protests over rising living costs. This has been going on for a long time. We've been living beyond our means. The former minister of economic reforms says that they have been absorbing more than they have been producing.
The government recently announced a $1 billion relief package, which included a pay and pension hike for government employees. It also announced income support for its poor citizens.
Chaminda Dissanayaka is the image source.
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Container rates from Europe to Asia have gone up.
The recovery of the global economy is at risk because of high freight rates, according to the UN agency. It predicts that small island nations like Sri Lanka will be hard hit by a spike in import prices.
Wholesale prices have been affected by the rising fuel and energy prices. The annual wholesale price-based inflation in India reached an all-time high of 14.2% in November.
Consumer price inflation in Pakistan rose to 12.3% in December, the highest in nearly two years, as the hike in food prices and other essentials was blamed on rising fuel costs.
"The high cost of inputs, ongoing global pandemic and ever more uncertain climatic conditions leave little room for optimism about a return to more stable market conditions, even in 2022," says the senior economist of the Food and Agriculture Organization.
Mrs Dilrukshi, who is now living on the breadline, is worried that if local prices rise just a little bit further, it will be difficult to keep the firewood burning in their kitchens.
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