Water rates in Israel due to rise by 4 percent in 2013

The Israeli Water Authority Council is set to approve on Thursday a four-percent hike in water rates, which would come into effect in 2013. The move is made amid higher tariffs for electricity, which is crucial for the production of water, as well as the need to use more desalinated water, which are expensive to produce. According to a Thursday report on the economic daily Globes, the prices hike would be finally authorized in November. Earlier this week, Israeli officials estimated a 10 percent increase in consumer prices for milk and dairy products at the end of the Jewish holidays in October. The reason for the presumed hike is that the rising global prices for commodities led to dairy farmers making lower profits than what they were initially guaranteed. Of late, both Israelis and Palestinians have seen sharp jumps in transportation fuel costs (amounting to 2.10 U.S. dollars per liter), a two percent hike in the Value-Added Tax and a rise in the prices of bread, real-estate and electricity. The nearly across-the-board rises are occurring amid a recently- approved austerity plan led by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz, aimed at curbing an increasing budget deficit. Last summer, hundreds of thousands of Israelis nationwide took to the streets in protest of the rising costs of living and the government\'s national priorities.