Consumers face inflated costs warns CIP

Portugal’s federation of business owners CIP has warned that there is now no margin to avoid increased costs for consumers.

In a message to mark International Labour Day which was being celebrated in a “difficult and threatening context”, the CIP which represents 150,000 companies which employ 1.8 million and which are responsible for 71% of Portugal’s GDP, states: “There is no room for manoeuvre to avoid an inflation in costs for consumers”.
The confederation also stresses “measures need to be taken to counter the seriousness of the situation”.
The CIP was referring to the war in Ukraine which has “caused inflation world-wide” states the CIP in an note sent to the media on Sunday. Even with the firm resistance of national companies” the confederation says: “It is vitally important to ensure that what has already happened to our European partners does not happen in Portugal”, meaning “avoiding that the jobs which were preserved at such a hog cost during the most acute phase of the pandemic are not now destroyed in a few months”.
As such, the confederation stresses “the seriousness of the crisis that we are facing should be understood, particularly by the government — a crisis that is still partly beneath the service, but would affect Portugal, its companies and jobs if nothing were done”.
The CIP also recognises that the country “has managed to create wealth at a good rate in this first quarter”, referring to data out last week which showed that the Portuguese economy had grown 2.6% quarter-on-quarter in the first three months of the year. However, It warned “various European countries are suffering stagflation”.