Weak employment outlook and rising consumer prices drive growth at Amman’s outdoors

Ongoing repercussions of the Covid-19 pandemic and the food inflation sparked by the Ukraine war are increasingly driving Jordanian consumers to look for bargains. In Jordan, the unemployment rate reached 22.6 percent during the second quarter of 2022, according to the Department of Statistics. The Kingdom’s CPI witnessed an increase of 20.97 percent this year. But the Ras al-Ain clothing market in downtown Amman is a bright spot for shoppers facing a dark economic outlook. The Amman municipality established the market in the Ras al-Ain downtown area in 2014. It has been a haven for the poor and the low-income. Increasingly middle-class families are seen here scouring for international clothing labels at wholesale prices. Wael Rabihat, head of the municipality department that oversees trading at Ras al-Ain, told A24 that the market attracts 100,000 shoppers on Thursday and Friday of each week.