Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps her Department is taking to tackle increases in food prices..

Tackling inflation is this Government’s number one priority, with a plan to more than halve inflation this year.

We understand that food price inflation reached 19.2% in March of this year, an increase compared to February 2023 when it was 18.2%. This was driven by a combination of inflationary factors across the food chain. Industry analysts are of the opinion that we are either at or very close to the food price inflation peak. They then expect food price inflation to gradually decrease over the remainder of 2023. This means that food prices are expected to still increase, but at a slower rate than before.

Food prices are set individually by businesses and it is not for HM Government to set retail food prices nor to comment on day-to-day commercial decisions by companies. Through regular engagement, Defra will continue to work with food retailers and producers to explore the range of measures they can take to ensure the availability of affordable food. For example, by maintaining value ranges, price matching and price freezing measures.