South African food and non-alcoholic beverage (hereafter: food) inflation jumped 1% in month-on-month terms in February, the Bureau for Food and Agricultural Policy (BFAP) has reported. In year-on-year terms, February’s food inflation figure was 13.6%, which was a 0.2% increase over January’s number. It was also nearly twice the country’s consumer price index (CPI) headline inflation of 7%. Food inflation contributed two percentage points to the CPI figure.

In month-on-month terms, last month, inflation in non-alcoholic beverages (NAB) ran at 1.6%. Bread and cereals, fish, dairy and eggs, and vegetables all had inflation of 1.3%. The figure for fruit was 1.2%, for sugar-rich foods, 0.5%, and for meat, 0.2%. Oils and fats had deflation of 0.2%.

In year-on-year terms, February saw bread and cereals suffering the highest inflation rate, 20.5%, followed by oils and fats at 16.7%. Then came vegetables at 15.7%, dairy and eggs at 12.3%, meat at 11.4%, sugar-rich foods (10.4%), NAB (10%) and fruit (3%).   

The commonly purchased food items which recorded the highest year-on-year inflation last month were beef (fillet, sirloin), pork (ham) and vegetables (onions, peppers). All these saw inflation of 30% or more. Food items which registered year-on-year inflation in the range of 20% to 29.9% were starch-rich foods (maize meal, wheat flour), beef (brisket), pork (bacon, chops), mutton/lamb (offal), fruit (apples, pineapples), vegetables (spinach, cabbage, cauliflower, pumpkin, carrots, potatoes) and NAB (Ceylon tea).

In the range of 10% to 19.9% were starch-rich foods (bread, pasta), beef (rump, chuck, T-bone, mince), pork (fillet, ribs), mutton/lamb (neck, stewing meat), chicken (giblets, frozen non-individually quick frozen [IQF] pieces), fish (canned pilchards, canned tuna), dairy (milk, powdered milk, whiteners), fats/oils (plant oils, margarine, peanut butter), vegetables (lettuce, broccoli, beetroot, mushrooms, sweet potatoes), legumes (canned baked beans), sugar-rich foods (various such foods) and NAB (coffee, rooibos tea). Items which experienced inflation from 6% to 9.9% were mutton/lamb (rib chops), chicken (fresh pieces, IQF pieces), fish (frozen fish fingers), dairy (cheddar cheese, sour milk, yoghurt), sugar-rich foods (granular sugar), and NAB (fruit juice, fizzy drinks).

Some food items actually registered year-on-year deflation in February. They were starch-rich foods (rice), beef (offal), mutton/lamb (leg), fruit (oranges, papaya, pears) and NAB (mineral water, fruit juice concentrate).

The price of the BFAP’s Thrifty Healthy Food Basket (THFB) increased month-on-month by 2.6%, or R89, and year-on-year by 12.4%, or R387. The THFB last month cost R3 504. (The THFB is composed of a balanced mix of 26 food items from all the food groups and is designed to feed a family of two adults and one older and one younger child for a month.) In February, buying the THFB would have cost a family earning two minimum wages, and benefitting from child grants and school feeding, 33.4% of its total income (as against 32.6% in January).

The BFAP cautioned that, while global food prices had been declining for 11 consecutive months, the depreciation of the rand had meant that this trend had had little effect in South Africa. And continuing loadshedding (scheduled power cuts) had imposed “significant” costs across the entire South African agriculture and food value chain. Food prices in the country over the coming months would be heavily dependent on the dynamics of the rand exchange rate and the intensity and frequency of loadshedding.