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By Anita Dangazele
- Food inflation fell to 0.9% in July, its lowest level since 2010, according to Stats SA.
- Despite that, the real household food basket tracked by PMBEJD still rose in July, with apples, maize meal, wors and tomatoes all more expensive.
Food inflation just hit its lowest point in 16 years. Try telling that to a family that just did their monthly shop.
Stats SA says annual food and non-alcoholic beverage inflation fell to 0.9% in July, the lowest reading since June 2010, helping bring overall inflation down to 4.3% from 5.0% in June. The drop was driven mainly by cheaper cereal products and meat, maize meal fell 3.1% nationally in a single month, and annual meat inflation slowed sharply from 5.1% to 1.5%.
But that’s not what the Pietermaritzburg Economic Justice and Dignity Group found when it priced 44 everyday foods directly at the supermarkets and butcheries working-class families actually use. Its basket rose in July, up R28.11 to R5,530.52. Apples rose 6%. Maize meal, the exact item Stats SA says got cheaper nationally, rose 4% in PMBEJD’s basket. Wors and tomatoes also rose 4%.
The gap between the two numbers comes down to what’s being measured and where. Stats SA tracks national retail trends across the whole country. PMBEJD tracks prices specifically in the townships and low-income areas where its basket is designed to reflect, Soweto, Khayelitsha, Umlazi and similar communities. Both are legitimate measurements. They’re just measuring different things.
What that means practically: a national number can improve while the actual cost of surviving on a low income does not. South Africa’s minimum wage already leaves a family of four short of the Food Poverty Line even before this month’s basket increase, a gap that a “good” inflation number does nothing to close.
Pictured above: A trolley full of groceries.
Image source: File
