GA-TOURISM-FOOD

With a view to make food "less

expensive" for tourists visiting Goa, the state tourism

department is mulling imposing a price ceiling in eateries and

other joints in the state, including beach shacks.

Tourism Minister Manohar Ajgaonkar Thursday said the

department was undertaking a study whether the price ceiling

could be imposed on the food items served at different outlets

in the tourism belt, especially in the beach shacks.

Hundreds of beach shacks are set up in the coastal

state during the tourism season.

"There has to be some control on the prices of food,

which will help tourists make their vacations less expensive,"

the minister said.

The state tourism department had recently admitted

that the New Year season this time had witnessed less

footfalls as compared to last year.

Stakeholders in the tourism sector have expressed

concerns over the decline in the number of tourists visiting

the state, popular for its beaches.

However, the government's possible move of fixing a

price ceiling has not gone down well with the shack owners.

"How can there be any ceiling as such? How will they

decide the rates? If they want they should curb the prices of

raw materials," Cruz Cardoso, president of Shack Owners'

Welfare Society, said.

He said the government should also impose restrictions

on the food tariff in five star hotels before thinking of

doing it to the shacks.

Cardoso said the shack owners will oppose any such

move.