With the onset of winter, the demand for warm clothes and devices to keep the homes warm has shot up by 100 percent in the Northern and Central Provinces of Saudi Arabia.
Markets supply plenty of woolen garments, blankets and thick cloths with varying price tags. Warm underclothes, such as pajamas of good quality, are sold at SR100 per piece while jacket prices range between SR90 and SR600.
Furs are sold at SR400 per piece. Electric room-heaters and water heaters are also in high demand. According to a shopkeeper, the price of a heater ranges between SR100 and SR700. He pointed out that heaters operated with oil are also in high demand.
Firewood prices have nearly doubled with the fall in temperature. A bundle of firewood is now being sold at SR35. It was SR15 before the onset of winter.
Firewood traders find it hard to procure the commodity in the face of stringent regulations against felling trees in the country.
Even though firewood is brought to the market from different parts of the Kingdom, Madinah is the major producer of firewood, he said. The Madinah product is also of better quality.
Firewood is in great demand in the northern towns and cities, where it is a social custom among the youngsters to sit late into the nights during winter, sipping gahwa, eating dinner in open areas around a bonfire.
The Civil Defense has urged people to take all safety measures while burning firewood or coal for heating at their homes, or at camping sites in the desert. “Firewood produces toxic fumes,” it warned.
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