Maud Descamps 12:42 p.m., September 15, 2021
From fruits and vegetables to grains, including oils, food prices have risen sharply since this summer.
This increase can be explained by a shortage of raw materials linked on the one hand to unfavorable weather, and on the other hand to very strong demand worldwide.
You have surely noticed it this summer on the shelves: the prices of fruits and vegetables have soared.
Their price has increased on average by 34% over the last twelve months.
But the outbreak is also affecting wheat, which has increased by 26% in one year, or oils, 39% more expensive over the same period.
To understand, we must look to the sky and to the law of the market.
The sky, first of all, extremely capricious in spring.
The very bad weather has damaged up to 60% of harvests in some regions and alone explains a good part of the increase in the prices of fruits and vegetables in particular.
"Everyone is rushing at the same time"
The law of the market, then, because as summarized by the president of the National Association of Food Industries (Ania), Jean-Philippe André, the demand is too strong at the global level. "Everyone is rushing at the same time for raw materials that need to be packaged. So everyone is rushing at the same time for packaging materials, like cardboard, and everyone needs their products. arrive at the right time to consumers "by appealing to carriers, he explains at the microphone of Europe 1.
"When you do all this at the same time on a global level, it should come as no surprise that there is a bottleneck in terms of demand, which inevitably results in higher prices," concludes the president of Ania. Food manufacturers believe they cannot cut back on their margins in the long term and warn that a rise of a few cents on products is inevitable.