Food prices rose 2% in July from June - the largest monthly rise since Ocober last year - on the back of big rises in tomato and green vegetable prices, as well as meat, poultry and fish prices, Statistics New Zealand says.
In the year to July, food prices rose 7.9%, from a 7.5% annual rise in June and up from a 3.8% annual price rise in the year to January 2011. Annual rises since October 2010 include the effect of the increase in GST from 12.5% to 15% on October 1, which led to a 2.2% rise in general prices, Stats NZ said.
See the release from Statistics New Zealand:
Food prices rose 2.0 percent in July 2011 and were up 7.9 percent on a year earlier, Statistics New Zealand said today. Vegetable prices rose 14.2 percent and accounted for more than half of the rise in July, mainly due to tomatoes and green vegetables.
There were seasonal price rises for tomatoes (up 34.0 percent), lettuce (up 20.7 percent), broccoli (up 66.6 percent), capsicums (up 28.6 percent), and cucumber (up 20.7 percent). "Tomato prices averaged $13.25 per kg in July, reflecting a supply shortage," Statistics NZ prices manager Chris Pike said.
The meat, poultry, and fish subgroup (up 3.7 percent), also made a significant upward contribution to the food price increase, reflecting higher prices for fresh chicken (up 8.6 percent). Lamb prices rose 7.7 percent and are now at their highest-recorded level.
In July 2011, grocery food prices rose 0.5 percent, reflecting higher prices for yoghurt (up 14.7 percent). Yoghurt prices are also at their highest-recorded level.
In the year to July 2011, food prices rose 7.9 percent. This includes a 2.2 percent rise in October 2010, when goods and services tax rose. All subgroups recorded increases: grocery food (up 7.2 percent), fruit and vegetables (up 15.9 percent), meat, poultry, and fish (up 6.8 percent), non-alcoholic beverages (up 9.0 percent), and restaurant meals and ready-to-eat food (up 4.2 percent).
The food price index (FPI) measures the rate of price change of food and food services purchased by households. Statistics NZ has completed a review of the FPI as part of a wider, three-yearly consumers price index review. The review involved updating the basket of representative food items being tracked for the FPI, and reviewing the relative importance of food items in the basket.
The new relative importance of the FPI subgroups shows that about $38 of every $100 households spend on food, is spent on grocery food. About $21 is spent on eating out or takeaways, and about $16 is spent on meat, poultry, and fish. Fruit and vegetables account for $14, and the remaining $11 is spent on non-alcoholic beverages, such as packaged coffee, soft drinks, and juices.
Four items – dried apricots, frozen berries, frozen chicken nuggets, and flatbread – have been added to the FPI basket. None have been removed.
Food prices index
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18 Comments
Rents and food prices have pushed inflation to 7.9% here in HK with further price rises expected.
Hong Kong warns of more inflation pain 04:46 AM Aug 24, 2011 HONG KONG - Hong Kong has warned that its inflation, which rose to a 16-year high last month, is likely to remain "notable" in the near term due to high global food prices and local private housing rents.
July's consumer prices rose 7.9 per cent on-year after a 5.6-per-cent increase in June, according to the official figures that were released on Monday.
The figure is the highest rate since 8.4 per cent was registered in November 1995. Excluding distortions caused by a public housing subsidy, prices rose 5.8 per cent.
The government said on Monday that the city's inflation is expected to remain "notable in the near term" because of elevated global food costs and domestic cost pressures.
Food costs had jumped 7.4 per cent last month from a year earlier as pork prices climbed, private-housing rentals rose 7.6 per cent and the absence of the government subsidy that was in place a year earlier meant public housing rents rose more than 3,000 per cent.
"The inflationary pressure is particularly worrying when coupled with contracting economic growth," said Mr Shen Jianguang, a Hong Kong-based economist with Mizuho Securities Asia.
The government will need to announce more "relief measures" including transport subsidies to relieve inflationary pressures, he said. AGENCIES http://www.todayonline.com/Business/EDC110824-0000386/Hong-Kong-warns-of-more-inflation-pain
Quick...change the way the index is formulated....hurry up!
This information getting out...it's a serious threat because rising food prices will encourage people to grow their bleeding own and once they cotton on to how easy it is using a bit of plastic and some poles to make a hothouse...the demand for produce will sort of shrivel up like an old apple.
Leading to a fall in gst revenue for Dunne to play with. And some veg growers saying 'bugger this for a joke" and going fishing. And English having to borrow more to fill the fiscal hole. Hells teeth we could see the pot plantations threatened by the Toms. Can you smoke Tom leaves?
Rather Hell's teeth than Helen's teeth eh Wolly?
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/image.cfm?c_id=2&gal_cid=2&gallery…
Or the RB has to lift the OCR, causing house prices to slump and the middle class get squeezed between rising costs and paying more for the house debt, so they go for a wage rise which the country can't afford. Then the drop in house prices causes the banks to get a downgrade so the cost of borrowing goes up and we start one of those spiral things.
I am skeptical that food price inflation is as bad as these StatsNZ data indicate.
We have started monitoring grocery prices in an organised way using supermarket online tools. And what we are finding is surprising me. We will publish the results of this monitoring when we have a longer run of data available.
However, what we are seeing is no price increases over the past 15 weeks or so. And that is counter-intuitive and interesting.
We have shopping lists based on an expert-based basket. It includes 'healthy food' choices. It also includes own-brand and 'specials' when available, much the same way real people shop.
And, it uses volumes/quantities that real shoppers would choose.
I strongly suspect the StatsNZ basket does not use 'specials' nor own-brand products, nor are the volumes very realistic. If true, those anomalies will distort the results (like buying out-of-season fruit and vegetables).
We are trying to get access to supermarket data so that we can test our shopping baskets back a number of years, but progress on that front is slow.
When we have the data that we have confidence in, we will release it.
In the meantime, I read these StatsNZ food price releases with some skepticism. Based on our preliminary work, I suspect they are overstating the level of food price increases.
Your view?
My feeling is that list prices are up as stated, and if you keep buying the same food items as and when you need them you will now be paying a lot more at the supermarket. Many people though aren't shopping like that any more and simply stop buying some products if the price rises. That has forced manufacturers to try and defend sales volumes by discounting heavily and regularly - providing an opportunity for those with the time and inclination to shop for discounted products at prices that with care may allow a lower supermarket spend than in the past.
Ive also been scratching my head, specials could explain some of it....for instance chicken brest is still about $18 a kilo, it went to $21 but dropped back, weeks ago.....fresh ready to roast chicken, its still on "special" after months at about $8~9 for a size 16.......fish also seems pretty steady.....I have my own spreadsheet where I recall the shopping costs weekly.....Im still staying close to my $250~300 a week for food. Ive switched to farmers markets for veg, thats saving me $1 to $3 (sometimes more) a kilo.....which is helping though.
Also Im wondering if there is a regional skew?.....so Wolly complains on prices going up in Blenheim? that I dont see in Wellington...
regards
Ive also noticed widely fluctuating prices on some things, the coffee we like for instance varies between $5.98, $6.38, $6.48 and $7.40 for 200g....so at the top I dont buy or buy 1 to keep me going, at he bottom I buy 6.....thats 8 weeks worth for me...then they can charge $7.40 and I dont care.......
regards
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