Damascus, SANA – Prime Minister Wael al-Halaqi called on the Agriculture Ministry to take steps to secure storage facilities for strategic crops and finding new mechanism for marketing agricultural products.
Chairing a weekly Cabinet meeting on Tuesday, al-Halaqi called on the Internal Trade and Consumer Protection Ministry to take new and effective steps to curb increases in prices in the market, and to continue working to provide the market’s needs of essential goods.
He also asserted that the government is monitoring the health sector in the country closely to prevent epidemics, stressing the need for better health supervision for public facilities, markets, restaurants, schools, and water facilities.
The Premier also underlined the need for periodic evaluation of industrial establishments in order to develop their performance, increase productivity, and isolate cases of squandering and unemployment.
State Minister for National Reconciliation Affairs Ali Haidar reviewed the results of his recent visits to al-Hosn in Homs countryside, Hasaka, al-Qamishli, and Amouda, and the overall progress of reconciliation efforts.
The Cabinet approved a draft resolution on allocating 50% of job vacancies in state establishments to relatives of martyrs, and discussed a bill on providing support for the families of martyrs, missing people, and people who sustained severe disabilities in military operations, in addition to discussing a memo from the Petroleum Ministry on the criteria and basis of distributing fuel in provinces.
On a relevant note, Premier al-Halaqi headed a meeting attended by Finance Minister Ismael Ismael, Director General of the Taxes and Fees Commission, head of the Artisans Union, and heads of the goldsmiths’ associations of Damascus, Aleppo, and Hama, in which the consumer spending fee for gold was discussed.
The meeting discussed mechanisms for collecting the fee as per the legislative decree no. 11 for 2015 which imposed the fee on a number of goods and services.
Hazem Sabbagh