Carrying ten fibre cement sheets, Ms. Hoang Thi Huyen in Ky Anh district said that the typhoon damaged her house’s roof. So she bought the fibre cement sheets to repair it with the price increasing VND5,000-10,000 a sheet.
Ms. Nguyen Thi Tai from the same district said that a 1.8 meter long sheet was priced VND53,000 a month ago, which has hiked by VND12,000 now.
Besides, it has been difficult to find house repairers. Mr. Nguyen Tien Can said that most of houses in Ky Dong commune, Ky Anh district have been roofless so local people have been seeking repairers with price up from VND250,000-270,000 a worker to VND300,000.
The prices of some building materials have increased by 10-15 percent at some shops. Despite the price hike, supply has still been insufficient because of residents’ large demand.
The owner of a building material shop in Ky Anh said that the sold volume of corrugated iron sheets has much increased over normal with price raising from VND108,000 a square meters to VND115,000. The price increase was inconsiderable as shops must use electric generators to cut corrugated iron because of power cutoff.
In Quang Binh province, the number of roofless houses is very large in Ba Don town, Minh Hoa and Tuyen Hoa districts. These houses have been built for 20 years so there are no old roof tiles while new products are not suitable with the houses’ purlin, lash and batten.
In addition, power blackout has occurred in rural areas in Quang Binh province raising difficulties for house repair.
An official from the Market Management Division of Ha Tinh province said that they have inspected and required a number of shops not to increase prices. The operation will be expanded to other shops to stabilize prices and prevent them from seeking profit from residents’ damage in the aftermath of the typhoon.
Quang Binh and Ha Tinh provinces have also sent personnel to inspect the market to stabilize prices of commodities in the market especially construction materials.
