{"id":134434,"date":"2025-11-15T08:56:19","date_gmt":"2025-11-15T08:56:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/134434\/"},"modified":"2025-11-15T08:56:19","modified_gmt":"2025-11-15T08:56:19","slug":"iran-households-cut-deeper-into-food-budgets-as-incomes-shrink","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/134434\/","title":{"rendered":"Iran households cut deeper into food budgets as incomes shrink"},"content":{"rendered":"

Average monthly incomes now stand near $200<\/a>, leaving millions unable to keep pace with food inflation. Many respondents said basic protein disappeared from their tables months ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur daily cost for five people is about 30,000,000 rials (around $27), not even counting meat, oil or rice,\u201d one respondent said. \u201cOur table has not just shrunk, it has been wiped out,\u201d the message said.<\/p>\n

Another described a timeline of disappearing foods: meat long ago, dairy a year ago, chicken six months ago, fruit four months ago. \u201cIt costs 1,000,000 rials (about $0.90) every time we buy bread. There is not much distance left until absolute hunger,\u201d the person said.<\/p>\n

One self-described employee earning 220,000,000 rials (around $195) a month and renting on a city\u2019s outskirts said survival required queuing for subsidized poultry. \u201cWe removed meat from our diet at Nowruz because we were coming up short,\u201d the message said.<\/p>\n

Several said long-considered staples \u2013 Iranian rice, fish, nuts, fresh fruit and legumes \u2013 had become aspirations. \u201cWe eat only bread, yogurt and rice from morning to night,\u201d another message said.<\/p>\n

Health concerns mounting<\/p>\n

In mid-October, domestic outlets reported that roughly 35 percent of recorded deaths were linked to undernutrition. Health ministry estimates say at least 10,000 people die each year from shortages of omega-3 fatty acids, another 10,000 from low fruit and vegetable intake, and about 25,000 from insufficient whole grains.<\/p>\n

Shortages extend beyond food<\/a>. \u201cPeople are cutting doctor visits and medicine before anything else,\u201d another respondent wrote. \u201cWe live on luck alone.\u201d<\/p>\n

One family of four said six months had passed since they last bought meat. \u201cLife has become hard. My 16-year-old son left school to work, yet we still cannot cover daily needs,\u201d the message said.<\/p>\n

Another wrote that the essentials most families consider the heart of a meal \u2013 red meat, chicken and fish \u2013 were now out of reach. \u201cIf this government continues, the rest will disappear too, whether we like it or not,\u201d the person said.<\/p>\n

Many described a shift to cheaper staples. \u201cEverything has been removed from my basket: fruit, dairy, meat, legumes. The only things I can still manage, with difficulty, are Indian rice, eggs and potatoes,\u201d one message said.<\/p>\n

Middle-class erosion<\/p>\n

Several respondents who once identified with the middle class said they were now buying fruit with difficulty. \u201cWe take four apples, some pears, persimmons, cucumbers and oranges \u2013 it reaches 20,000,000 rials (around $18). One kilo of meat is 15,000,000 rials (about $13),\u201d a message said, calling the situation \u201cfrightening and broken.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Travel \u2013 once a marker of modest stability \u2013 has vanished. \u201cRed meat, chicken, fish, clothes and gold have become dreams. Travel is zero,\u201d one person said.<\/p>\n

Amid the accounts of vanished foods<\/a>, one message pressed for solutions rather than surveys. \u201cWe need a way out, not a question whose answer we all already know,\u201d the person said.<\/p>\n

Independent labor and pensioner groups warned in a joint 21 October statement that worsening living conditions and unanswered demands were pushing more workers, teachers and retirees toward street-level protest. They wrote that daily demonstrations reflected a determination to \u201cwin rights and express grievances\u201d despite the economic strain.<\/p>\n

The broad concern running through the messages is not only what families can no longer buy, but how long they can endure a decline that has turned routine meals into calculations of survival.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Average monthly incomes now stand near $200, leaving millions unable to keep pace with food inflation. Many respondents…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":134435,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[114,184,85,46],"class_list":["post-134434","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-economy","tag-il","tag-israel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134434","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=134434"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134434\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/134435"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=134434"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=134434"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=134434"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}