Iran's store owners take to the streets in anger. Live from the UK, this is the Marketplace

Morning Report from the BBC World Service. I'm Gideon Long. Good morning. We're starting the

program in the Iranian capital Tehran.

That's the sound of shopkeepers demonstrating for a second successive day,

shouting Bisharaf, which means dishonourable in Persian.

A slogan they were directing at the government.

Annual inflation is running at over 40% and business owners are angry at the rapid devaluation of the currency, the real,

in part due to the pressure of Western sanctions. Arash Azizi is an Iranian journalist based in the US.

It has lost half of its value in the last year, but even if you go a little more, it's third

of what it was just like 18 months ago. So people lose their savings. They're really affected

because much of the things you

have to buy are linked to the international market in one way or the other. And many people deal

with foreign currency more directly. Their job is linked to it in one way or the other or they

have to buy commodities in the global market. So the fact that Iran is doing really bad and the

economy is in a terrible condition and people have really become widespread is somewhat a point of consensus now.

So how has the government responded?

The central bank governor of Iran is going to change now. There is hope that that would do something to the currency market.

The dissent in Iran is very deep-seated.

Iranians for so long have not been able to imagine a better future.

In the last year, they've had a terrible situation in water, in electricity.

There's been serious cuts.

There's been followed in the standards of living.

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