Food in the Czech Republic is becoming more and more expensive. The price increase for vegetables is particularly high, as the statistics office announced on Wednesday. Onions are now three times more expensive than in the Czech Republic in the previous year. The prices are also rising for other vegetables. For potatoes, the price is twice as high as in May last year. The price increase is mainly due to the drought last year, which resulted in a yield that is one-fifth lower than usual.
Agrarian analyst Petr Havel spoke of more reasons at Radio Praha: "There are intermediate links in the production chain - processing after harvest, storage, packaging and peeling of potatoes. Every stage will cost a bit more. So the cost goes up, and the prices go up."
Declining number of potato producers
As a result of this development, the number of potato growers in the Czech Republic and the extent of arable land sown with potatoes are dropping. Only a few vegetables are currently seeing price decreases. "In May, we recorded a price increase over the previous month of April in almost all types of vegetables. Broccoli, however, was 24 per cent cheaper, and tomatoes were 18 per cent cheaper," said Tomáš Chrámecký of the Czech Statistical Office.
According to the Chairman of the Association of Vegetable Growers in Bohemia and Moravia, Petr Hanka, the Czech Republic is able to cover about a third of the general demand by domestic cultivation. He told news portal irozshlas.cz: "We are able to meet most of the needs of Czech consumers during the summer months. But after that season we are completely dependent on imports. The huge amounts of money that consumers have had to pay for vegetables this year have just gone abroad," says Hanka.
Inflation continues to rise
According to the association, it would help if there were more storage facilities where growers could store vegetables all year round. For farmers, it is also cheaper to grow cereals or rape, whose cultivation is cheaper than that of potatoes. Vegetable prices are also driving up inflation, which reached 2.9 percent in May.
Source: Radio Praha