Food prices likely to keep rising for over another year: Analyst

ANKARA

The current general rise in food prices will continue for another year and a half, according to a US-based media outlet, citing an analyst.

"We haven't seen anything yet," said Phil Lempert, a food industry analyst and the editor of the website SuperMarketGuru.com, on recent climbs in grocery bills, warning of more increases yet to come, CBS News reported on Wednesday.

"Prices are going to continue to go up for a good year and a half," he warned. "The biggest increases we will see has to do with anything with animals, whether it's eggs or milk or pork or beef."

Wholesale prices increased by 8.3% year-on-year in August, the US Labor Department has reported, marking the steepest gains since it started tracking the figure more than a decade ago.

Observing limited store supplies of products like milk, butter, soda, snacks, paper products, and baking supplies, CBS Los Angeles said record-high wholesale prices and scarcity of certain items have drawn shoppers' attention.

While the climbing food price are due in part to massive losses in feed supplies because of the wildfires earlier this year in California, other supply chain issues like bottlenecks at the Port of Los Angeles and labor shortages also contributed.

Pointing out also a "major lack of truck drivers," Lempert said the cost of refrigerated transport was up by about 10.4%.

"Retailers who are filling out their orders to fill their shelves are not getting what they order," he explained, adding that they were only receiving an estimated 50-70% of their orders.

Amid the falling supplies and rising prices, the report also cited a shopper, Kathleen Postal, who said she was having "a hard time" finding the things she wanted while grocery shopping.

"Everything just seems to be a dollar to two dollars higher," she said. "This creep has just happened and it's very expensive."