Mill sealed in rural Damascus
The Internal Trade and Consumer Protection Directorate in rural Damascus shut down a private mill on 14 May 2026 after inspectors found that it was illegally converting subsidized flour. The action was announced the same day by Abdullah Darbas, who heads the directorate's consumer protection and food safety unit.
According to the directorate, patrols found that the mill had sifted approximately 30 tons of subsidized flour and transformed it into so-called "zero" grade flour for illegal sale on the open market. The site was sealed in full after its owner fled.
Owner flees, case referred
"The patrols sealed the entire mill after the owner fled," Darbas said, adding that "necessary legal procedures were completed and the case was referred to the competent ministerial committee."
That committee is the escalation route the directorate uses for cases involving manipulation of subsidized commodities, and its rulings sit within the wider enforcement track run by the Ministry of Economy and Industry.
Threat to livelihoods cited
Darbas described the manipulation of subsidized materials as a direct threat to citizens' livelihoods and to market stability. He said the directorate would intensify market surveillance and act against any party manipulating or exploiting subsidized commodities.
The closure landed against a softening Syrian pound (SYP), which traded at 13,760 to the US dollar (USD) on 14 May 2026 after weakening roughly 4.6 percent over the previous month, a backdrop that has tightened household budgets across the country.
Wider provincial campaign
The Ministry of Economy and Industry has continued coordinated oversight campaigns across provinces targeting subsidized commodity violations. The closure in rural Damascus joins a wider drive that the directorate has framed as continuous rather than episodic.
Removing roughly 30 tons of diverted flour from the unlicensed market at a single facility offers a concrete measure of the leakage that consumer-protection authorities are trying to police across the country.