As the global food crisis worsens thanks to the ongoing war in Ukraine, wholesale prices in Germany have spiked, seeing their greatest yearly rise in 60 years.
The wholesale costs of fuel, minerals and food in Germany have seen their greatest yearly rise in 60 years, prompting fears of stock shortages and sky-high prices.
Germany — along with a host of other European countries — is already experiencing chronic shortages of a variety of products, including the likes of flour and sunflower oil, with food manufacturers, in particular, struggling to adjust recipes and production methods to keep factory lines moving with substitute ingredients.
The worst is still yet to come, though, according to a report by German Federal Statistics Office Destatis which records the cost of wholesale goods as having gone up 22.6 per cent in March 2022 compared to March last year.
This represents the single greatest jump in prices since record-keeping for the statistic began.
“The high rates of change for wholesale prices mainly derive from increased prices for raw materials and intermediate products,” the federal office’s report reads. “These results refer to the reference date 5 March 2022 and should therefore contain first implications deriving from Russia’s attack on Ukraine.”
“The largest impact on the annual rate of change in March 2022 had the price increase in wholesale trade of mineral oil products (+70.2 per cent),” the report continues. “The high price increase in wholesale trade of solid fuels (+61.9 per cent) as well as metals and metal ores (+55.8 per cent) also contributed to the high rate of change in March 2022.”
Food also saw extreme increases from the previous year, with the price of meat up an average of over ten per cent, while the wholesale cost of eggs, dairy products, cooking oils and dietary fats saw a hike of 22.6 per cent.
Europe as a whole has already been experiencing significant difficulties regarding its food supply in recent months, with supply disruptions in Ukraine having significant knock-on effects on the cost and availability of a variety of raw materials.
Such supply disruptions have already started causing problems for the European food industry, with potato chip makers in Britain struggling to source the sunflower oil needed to make the snack, while confectionary makers in Germany struggling with the increased prices of raw materials, such as wheat and gas used to fuel production.
Everyday citizens have also been on the receiving end of such difficulties, with German supermarkets hiking the purchase price of a variety of goods such as cooking oil, margarine, sausages and cheese by as much as 50 per cent.
“Due to the situation on the world markets, we will experience jumps in sales prices that have never been seen before,” said Florian Scholbeck, the managing director of Aldi North, while explaining the price hikes.
The company official however emphasised that there would be “no empty shelves”, though this seems to be in at least partial contradiction with reporting from German news outlets regarding the availability of sunflower oil in particular.
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