/05 to 2008/09, prices of major cereals (teff, maize, wheat and sorghum) have fluctuated sharply in both nominal and real … staples, only wheat is imported or exported on a significant scale. And frequent changes in trade and macro-economic policies … imports of wheat. From July 2005 to March 2007, private sector wheat imports were profitable and domestic wheat prices closely …

Beginning in April 2008, lack of access to foreign exchange effectively stopped private sector wheat imports … lowered market wheat prices, though market prices remained above import parity levels. Allowing the private sector access to … foreign exchange for wheat imports (or auctioning government wheat imports of the same volume) would have eliminated the wheat …