{"id":828473,"date":"2025-06-18T11:02:11","date_gmt":"2025-06-18T09:02:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=828473"},"modified":"2025-06-18T11:50:06","modified_gmt":"2025-06-18T09:50:06","slug":"bad-news-for-meat-and-seafood-lovers-in-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business\/828473\/bad-news-for-meat-and-seafood-lovers-in-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"Trouble for meat and seafood lovers in South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Consumer price inflation in South Africa remained stable in May, but rising seafood and meat prices are adding pressure to food bills, especially beef.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Consumer price inflation remained unchanged at 2.8% in May. The consumer price index increased by only 0.2% between April and May.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Food & non-alcoholic beverages is the only category that contributed to the monthly rise in the CPI, with a 1.1% monthly increase.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The annual rate for the category increased from 4.0% in April to 4.8% in May, the highest print since March 2024 when the rate stood at 5.1%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meat, especially beef, is a key reason for the rise in food inflation. The annual rate for meat jumped from 3.0% in April to 4.4% in May. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In April, monthly increases for beef products ranged from 6.2% to 11.9%. In May, notable increases were recorded for beef steak, up 4.5%, stewing beef, up 2.5% and beef mince, up 1.7%. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA widespread outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease, combined with higher feed prices, contributed to the rise in beef inflation,\u201d said Stats SA. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The fish & other seafood category recorded an annual increase of 4.9% in May, up from 4.8% in April. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hake stands at 9.1% and fish fingers at 6.1%, which is more expensive than a year ago. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The annual rate for oils and fats was 5.6%, the highest since April 2023\u2019s 10.0%. Sunflower oil recorded a yearly increase of 7.6% and brick margarine 7.9%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Vegetable prices tend to be highly volatile, depending on seasonal factors. The annual rate for the category was 10.3% in May, up from the recent low of -2.6% in November 2024. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The rate in May is the highest since January 2024, when it was 12.6%. High annual increases were recorded for beetroot (64.0%), lettuce (20.9%) and carrots (13.4%).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maize meal and samp also continue to record high price increases, with the annual rate for cereal products standing at 4.5% in May, with double-digit inflation registered for maise meal (14.2%) and samp (20.6%). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, apart from biscuits, most wheat-based products are still experiencing low inflation rates. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Savoury biscuits saw a monthly increase of 2.2%, increasing the annual rate to 12.5%. Sweet biscuits saw a monthly rise of 1.5% and a yearly growth of 6.4%.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Some good signs <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

There was other good news from the latest stats, with the inflation rates for hot beverages subsiding. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The index was unchanged between April and May, but the annual increase slowed from 15.2% in April to 12.4% in May. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is the lowest year-on-year rate for hot beverages since April 2024, when it was 11.4%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fuel prices also dropped by 1.1% between April and May, pushing the annual rate down to negative 14.9%. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is the most significant annual decrease for fuel since October 2024 when the rate was -19,1%. Petrol is 15.9% and diesel 12.6% cheaper than the previous year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The positive trend should continue into June’s stats, thanks to a small petrol and diesel price cut this month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, there are some red flags moving into July, with the latest spike in oil prices because of the escalating war in the Middle East pointing to a possible hike.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Should fuel price recoveries remain strained through to the end of the month and a price hike realised, inflation will likely come under pressure.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The latest data from Stats SA shows that meat and seafood prices in South Africa have increased, especially beef.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":95,"featured_media":701303,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872],"tags":[1809],"class_list":["post-828473","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-stats-sa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/828473","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/95"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=828473"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/828473\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":828511,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/828473\/revisions\/828511"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/701303"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=828473"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=828473"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=828473"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}