People choose vegetables at a supermarket in Changchun, capital of Jilin province. [Photo by Wang Jiaqi and Zhang Mingyue/Changchun Daily]

Northeast China’s Jilin province is ensuring the supplies of food and other daily necessities for its people, in the meantime making concerted moves in preventing and controlling the spread of the novel coronavirus, according to local officials.

According to statistics from the province’s nine main cities on Feb 3, grain and oil prices fluctuated in a small range; the price of meat, poultry, eggs and fish had decreased slightly; while the price of vegetables declined and the price of fruit also saw a reduction.

Since the outbreak of the epidemic, Jilin authorities have placed their focus on ensuring people’s food supplies and daily requirements, according to officials.

The government asked supermarkets to increase procurements, so as to meet people’s purchasing needs.

Currently, Jilin cities are providing sufficient daily necessities and consumers don’t need to worry, said Meng Qingyu, deputy director of the Department of Commerce of Jilin Province.

Officials said that next all cities in the province would increase storage, optimize reporting and monitoring mechanisms and encourage vegetable producers to improve production capacity, so as to ensure supplies of sufficient daily requirements for residents.

In addition, the provincial market supervision and management authority has also paid close attention to market price of daily necessities, punishing those who inflated prices.