I don't know if you've been reading news' articles about food inflation for 2021. There are some foods that we can expect to pay more for this year. Here's the list so far for the year:
- Coffee -- due to drought in Brazil
- Cheese, especially Parmesan -- increases related to shipping, herd feed prices, and aging of cheese
- Meat and dairy -- due to shortage of some animal feed
- Poultry -- avian influenza affecting poultry in EU
- Imported seafood -- port issues
- Vegetable oil -- drought in Brazil affecting soy, labor-strike in Argentina, and increased demand from China for vegetable oil fueling shortages combined with Russia's increased export tax on sunflower seed and oil (Russia is world's largest exporter of sunflower seeds) and Thailand and Malaysia's lower than expected palm oil production
- Grains -- due to China's increased demand for grains as feed for increasing their livestock herds, Russia's increased export tax, US mid-west/Ukraine/Argentina/Brazil crop reductions/failures (weather-related)
- Sugar -- fears over worsening crop prospects this coming year in South America, Thailand, EU, and Russia
It goes without saying, many processed foods will also bear higher prices or shrinking packages. Kraft-Heinz, Conagra (Duncan Hines, Marie Callender's), and Unilever (Lipton, Hellmann's) have already announced price increases for this coming year, due to higher cost of grains and sugar. Mayonnaise, a product that uses vegetable oil, is already more expensive than it was just 6 months ago.
So, what am I doing about this? I'm once-again dedicating more of our income to grocery purchases, trying to get a step ahead on these key food items. I'll also be setting aside a bit of our surplus of ingredients that I'll want to use next fall and winter holiday season. It's common sense that we'll likely feel the full brunt of food inflation, then, just as Americans do their annual holiday big-baking and cooking to celebrate what we hope will be the first "normal" holiday season with loved ones.
