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

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the recent price increases in fruit and vegetables, in the light of shortages brought about as a result of climatic conditions.

Commodity prices, exchange rates and oil prices have been observed to be the most important drivers of retail food price inflation. Implicit in commodity prices are short term weather conditions and longer term climatic changes.

We monitor food prices using the Consumer Prices Index (CPI). Food prices rose by 0.2 per cent in the month to January 2017. Year on year, food prices have continued to fall with an annual rate of inflation of -0.5 per cent in the year to January 2017, according to the most recent official figures released on 14th February 2017.

Food and non-alcoholic beverages account for around ten per cent of the overall CPI, of which vegetables account for 1.3 per cent and fruit 0.9 per cent. The recent salad vegetable shortages caused by severe weather in southern Europe affected a relatively small number of items. This event is unlikely to have a significant impact on food prices overall.