Turks are cutting back on leisure to cope with inflation

Audio 01:24

In Ankara, restaurants are less and less frequented because of inflation.

(Drawing).

AFP - ADEM ALTAN

Text by: RFI Follow

2 mins

80.2%: this is the inflation rate in August, over one year, in Turkey.

This is the official rate, published this Monday, September 5 by the National Statistics Agency, but disputed by a group of independent economists who place it rather above 180%.

It is, in any case, an unprecedented level for more than twenty years and the coming to power of the party of Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Nine months before the elections, the general rise in prices is fueling discontent among the population.

Especially since, to cope, many Turks have had to limit their social life, or even give it up.

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With our correspondent in Istanbul,

Anne Andlauer

Bekir, 37, father of two children, is an accountant in a company.

He therefore knows what he is talking about when he says that he has "

done his accounts

" and that the calculation is final.

As everything has become three or four times more expensive, we focus on basic needs.

We try to avoid extras

.

»

What Bekir calls “extras” is the cinema session or the small restaurant that he arranged with his wife several times a month;

the trip to the mall play area where he often took his sons.

And even, this summer, family vacations: “

As my wife also works, we used to eat outside often.

Now, we do it much less, we eat at home, we visit our family members less.

The same goes for vacations, because the trip by car is as expensive as the stay itself.

 »

“No money to buy me books”

Like Bekir, many Turks are cutting back on their social lives to cope with

falling purchasing power

.

In August, year on year, prices in restaurants soared 81%.

In the entertainment and culture sector, the increase exceeds 58%.

Beyza, a student, has given up on her hobbies.

“ 

To pay for my studies, I work every day

: in bookstores, cafes, bars.

But I don't have money to buy books, have a drink or take care of myself!

And our president would like the youth to keep quiet under these conditions?

»

The next elections, legislative and presidential, will take place no later than June 2023.

To read also:

“It does not stop, this inflation!

”: in Turkey, the price of fuel explodes

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