The Minister Delegate for Overseas Territories, Jean-François Carenco, believes that creating a basket of products at regulated prices could help lower the cost of living in Mayotte, where 77% of the population lives below the poverty, as in the other overseas territories. He intends to obtain “a global agreement” with the suppliers “at the end of September, beginning of October”, after having “asked the prefect to determine the basket and to meet the local actors on this subject”.
He thus opened a dialogue with Rodolphe Saadé, CEO of CMA-CGM, the main carrier in Mayotte. “It’s about locking in prices with the very complicated idea that transporting a container of potatoes is the same price as transporting a container of gold jewellery. We must therefore manage to ensure that the price depends on what is transported, ”explains the minister.
But “we have to work on the income problem, which is a global issue. This island needs to live better. To talk about expensive living without saying that is to solve the problem for five minutes, ”defends Jean-François Carenco. “I forbid myself to say ‘let’s solve the problem of expensive living just by actions on prices’. The problem is that this island is not sufficiently capable of producing what it eats. According to him, the island does not create enough value. To remedy this, the minister has a “leitmotif”: “Creating value means accountability, means infrastructure, means training. »