English breakfast

The article is from the Daily Telegraph (20.11.2007). The Daily Telegraph is a right-wing newspaper which supports the Conservative Party. The article refers to massive price rises for food in the UK, which are caused neither by the EURO nor by the local (in this case British and Labour Party) government but by global economic factors.

Price of 'full English' breakfast rises sharply
By Harry Wallop, Daily Telegraph Consumer Affairs Correspondent
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/11/20/nprices120.xml

The price of a traditional English breakfast has soared as high food costs continue to hit shoppers in the pocket.

The prices of eggs, bacon and bread have all risen considerably in the last year Eggs, bacon, butter, milk and bread are all rising in price far faster than the official food inflation figures, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said yesterday. Bacon prices have climbed by 7.5 per cent in the past month, while the cost of butter and milk continued to reach new highs during October. Eggs, which shot up by 8.6 per cent over the month, are now an astonishing 26.2 per cent more expensive than a year ago.

Cooking a full English breakfast every day now would mean your weekly bill would most likely be at least £1 more than a year ago. Half a dozen medium eggs now costs £1.17 compared with 93p a year ago, a wholemeal loaf has increased by 10p to £1.01 and a pint of milk has gone up from 35p to 39p. In the past month, bacon has increased from £1.98 for a standard 275g pack to £2.19. These price rises - in excess of the official food inflation rate of 5.1 per cent - come on top of other soaring household bills such as the price of petrol, council tax and mortgage payments.

This is the second year in a row that breakfast eaters have suffered from inflation-busting price rises. Last year the price of tea was affected by a drought in east Africa. The figures are the latest evidence that turmoil in the global commodity markets is filtering down to people's weekly shopping baskets. It comes only a week after separate ONS figures showed that wholesale food prices - the cost to factories for their ingredients - are running at a 14-year high.

Experts say these price increases will soon be passed to shoppers, meaning that higher weekly shopping bills are here to stay. The latest food figures follow research from mysupermarket.com, which found that the three biggest supermarkets - Tesco, Asda and Sainsbury's - are charging their shoppers 12 per cent more on average for a basket of 25 staple goods compared with last year. The annual grocery bill for a family of four has risen by £750 a year. This is despite high-profile price-cutting campaigns and claims from supermarket groups that they are doing their utmost to absorb food price inflation.

Most food prices have been affected by turmoil in the global wheat markets, caused by a series of terrible harvests and increased demand from China and India, where consumers are switching to a more westernised diet. This, in turn, has pushed up animal feed costs, which has resulted in surging prices for dairy and meat products.

Julian Lakin, a food analyst at the City firm Mirabaud Securities, said: "It's amazing how many staple food products contain grain, dairy or fat. Anyone buying bread, flour, cakes, milk or butter will have started to notice food inflation." Chris Lamb, from the Meat and Livestock Commission, said that the price increases were still not enough to cover a huge escalation in costs for pig farmers. He argued that shoppers would have to become used to yet higher prices. "British pig farmers are losing £3.6 million from the cost of animal feed. Two-thirds of raising a pig is animal feed, and farmers until last month have not been able to pass on any of these costs." Duncan Priestly, a leading egg farmer, said that the increased cost of poultry feed - from £126 a ton to £186 a ton - had hit farmers hard and they were simply passing on the costs. online