What did people do when the price of all their grocery favourites went up and up thanks to inflation? It seems we traded-in milk, cheese, fresh fruit and veggies for chicken nuggets and chocolate.

The past few years have been tough financially for many of us. Inflation rocketed to nearly 8 per cent by the end of 2022 and in response, the Reserve Bank hiked official interest rates to levels not seen for 12 years. And those rates have been mostly passed on by commercial banks to anyone with a home loan.

Supermarkets are often the first target of public ire about prices, but their margins are modest compared to some of their suppliers.Credit: Ridofranz

In response to those financial pressures, households have reduced their spending on a range of goods and services – we’ve been spending less on household goods and dining out, for instance.

But what we haven’t really been able to gauge is how the cost of living pressures changed our grocery habits. Enter the Australian Bureau of Statistics and its data on our “apparent consumption of selected foodstuffs”.

This data measures the amount of food and non-alcoholic drinks we purchase from the major supermarkets, butchers, bakeries, delis and convenience stores, and uses that to work out the daily average consumption of those foods and drinks per person in Australia.

(It’s called apparent consumption because not all the food and drink we purchase is eaten – some is stored for later, and plenty of soggy vegetables end up in the bin at the end of the week.)

All up, we bought 14.8 million tonnes of food and drink from food retailers in the last financial year (excluding cafes, restaurants and takeaway joints). That’s 1.9 per cent or 292,300 tonnes less than the previous financial year.

Per person, that’s 63 grams or 337 kilojoules less in food a day and the first time since the ABS started compiling this data in 2018.

QOSHE - Coping with higher prices on smaller portions and chicken nuggets - Rachel Clun
menu_open
Columnists Actual . Favourites . Archive
We use cookies to provide some features and experiences in QOSHE

More information  .  Close
Aa Aa Aa
- A +

Coping with higher prices on smaller portions and chicken nuggets

11 0
14.04.2024

What did people do when the price of all their grocery favourites went up and up thanks to inflation? It seems we traded-in milk, cheese, fresh fruit and veggies for chicken nuggets and chocolate.

The past few years have been tough financially for many of us. Inflation rocketed to nearly 8 per cent by the end of 2022 and in response, the Reserve Bank hiked official interest rates to levels not seen for 12 years. And those rates have been mostly passed on by commercial banks to........

© The Sydney Morning Herald


Get it on Google Play