A month ago, Gholamreza Mesbahimoghaddam, a former member of the parliament who claims to have studied economics and is now the head of the Infrastructure and Production Commission in the regime’s Expediency Council, expressed some astonishing comments about China’s economic progress. He said that if the Chinese have made progress, it is due to their contentment with eating food.
“The Chinese satisfy themselves with just one or two meals a day,” Mesbahimoghaddam said. Following his deceitful statement, a typical hypocritic stance from Iranian state clerics, aimed at fooling Iranians with less food on their table in the name of piety, he faced severe criticism in the media and on social networks. Many critics pointed out that China’s progress was a result of rapid development plans implemented over four decades, lifting 800 million people out of poverty. Not long ago, they even celebrated the end of absolute poverty in their country.
Meanwhile, the statistics show that at least 30 million Iranians have fallen below the poverty line, with a third of them plunging into destitution in the past decade. With the ever-soaring prices and skyrocketing inflation, the poverty line has become a shifting phenomenon, and many Iranians are seriously wondering how long they can afford a loaf of bread every day.
Interestingly, official statistics reveal that “per capita, meat consumption (red meat, poultry, fish) in Iran is 34 kilograms annually, while in China, it exceeds 53 kilograms.” This means that the Chinese consume almost twice as much meat as Iranians.
Compared to North Korea, a country known for its isolation and economic struggles, is perhaps more realistic for the clerical regime in Iran. While Iranian state media and officials pity North Koreans, the situation in Iran is even worse for the oppressed population.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, the annual per capita consumption of red meat in various countries is as follows: Ghana 9 kg, Guinea 5.6 kg, Nigeria 5.8 kg, India 5.3 kg, Iraq 8.7 kg, Tanzania 10 kg, Yemen 6.14 kg, and North Korea 8.10 kg. Surprisingly, the statistics reveal that North Korea’s red meat consumption, along with countries like Tanzania and Iraq, exceeds Iran’s.
According to a report published by the Research Center of the Sharif University of Technology, the percentage of households that have not consumed red meat in the past year has reached 58% in the year 1400 (2021-2022). In simpler terms, approximately 49 million people have not eaten any red meat in one year.
According to the state-run Arman-e-Melli, Masoud Rassouli, the Secretary of the Association of Meat and Protein Packaging Industry, mentioned that the Statistical Center of Iran has reported an annual per capita consumption of 4 kilograms of red meat. However, the reality is that the actual consumption is around 3 kilograms per person. It is concerning to note that this statistic applies to every individual in society.
Drastic Increase in Prices Has Severely Reduced Food Consumption in #Iran
The increase in milk and meat prices has led to a decrease in per capita consumption of these essential needs.https://t.co/1Vsgnn2FDf pic.twitter.com/2AigloNo06— NCRI-FAC (@iran_policy) July 2, 2019
On November 22, 2022, highlighting that the country’s meat consumption is less than 17 percent the world’s rate, the state-run ECO Iran wrote, “According to the review of 2022 FAO data, Iran’s consumption of red meat is 6 kg.”
The changing rates indicate a shocking decline of almost 50 percent in less than a year that forecasts serious medical implications in the population’s nutrition and physical growth.
The economic crises under the rule of Iran’s religious fascism go beyond just the lack of meat and empty tables for the Iranian people. It extends to the absence of drinkable water, the rising cost of bread, the struggle to buy it in limited quantities, the prevalence of sleeping in containers, and the plight of unemployment and destitution affecting millions of Iranians. Eating meat has become a luxury amid these hardships.
Gholamali Jafarzadeh Aminabadi, a former member of the parliamentary Budget and Planning Commission, exposed the Raisi government’s manipulated statistics, including inflation figures, and stated that these manipulations cannot hide the reality.
“Unfortunately, there’s no honesty in this government,” Jafarzadeh Aminabadi said on July 27. “Manipulating statistics and changing the basis of calculation cannot alter the true inflation rate. In fact, the government changed the base year for calculating inflation from 1395 to 1399 to artificially reduce the percentage. Another issue is that they tamper with the numbers.”
“The economy is in shambles because of the excessive liquidity, banknote printing, and inflation have led us closer to an economic collapse,” he warned.
As ordinary Iranians grapple with livelihood challenges, the regime’s ambition to further its own agenda has come at the expense of the nation’s prosperity. With each passing day, the Iranian people are being pushed further away from normalcy, and the growing discontent and frustration in society pose a potential threat of outrage.
With each passing day, the Iranian people are being pushed further away from normalcy, they dangerously get closer to the point of bursting outrage and all indications of the last uprisings since 2017 indicate a nation that has nothing more to lose.