“To brie or to not brie?”
That’s the query Australian shoppers will probably be asking themselves within the refrigerated aisle at their native grocery store after a surprising 16 per cent rise within the worth of cheese was recorded within the yr to September.
Inflation has elevated 5.4 per cent over the previous 12 months, based on the Australian Bureau of Statistics, as excessive petrol prices, the tight rental market and hovering electrical energy prices pushed shopper costs greater.
However different items have additionally pushed up inflation.
Certainly, throughout all the basket of products the ABS makes use of to calculate the buyer worth index, cheese costs spiked by greater than every other product.
Costs for dairy merchandise throughout the board rose by 12.1 per cent up to now yr resulting from elevated farmgate milk costs, the ABS stated, whereas different working prices together with electrical energy and labour additionally drove up costs for the gastronomical expertise.
Except for cheese, different will increase in dairy staples had been additionally vital. Ice cream costs rose 11.2 per cent, whereas milk costs rose 5.5 per cent over the identical interval.
However not all objects within the grocery store trolley had been marked up – fruit and vegetable costs fell 6.4 per cent within the yr to September, the ABS knowledge confirmed.
The skyrocketing worth of cheese will come as one other blow to households already battling the price of dwelling crunch.
Responding to questions on meals inflation on Wednesday, Treasurer Jim Chalmers stated that costs within the grocery sector had been beneath “fixed overview”.
“We count on all supermarkets and all retailers within the grocery sector to deal with their prospects pretty,” Dr Chalmers stated.
“We need to see their costs come down when a few of their enter prices come down.”
Dr Chalmers added that the federal government was at present contemplating a overview of the Meals and Grocery Code which was offered to the federal government by the Division of Treasury in September.
However shadow treasurer Angus Taylor blamed the federal government for exacerbating inflationary pressures.
“They will acutely really feel the ache of Labor’s price of dwelling disaster of their financial institution accounts and family budgets,” Mr Taylor stated.
