Food Prices

The SST reported:

Rising food prices have heightened public calls to make healthy eating more affordable. 

IN THE wake of moves to freeze the price of milk, calls are growing for cheaper food.

The government has already rejected removing its 15% GST from food, but a Sunday Star-Times online poll last week revealed almost two-to-one support for removing the tax from fruit and vegetables.

I’m amused that the media are doing stories on the costs of fruit and vegetables during a period when they are in fact hardly rising at all, but seemed to never do a story when they were going up.

The Food Price Index for fruit and vegetables goes back to 1999. From December 1999 to December 2008 the cost of fruit and vegetables went up 44% or 4.9% a year. From December 2008 to December 2010 it went up 3% or 1.7% a year.

Note that the 1.7% a year over the last two years includes the impact of the GST increase.