Editorial: Price of supermarket fruit and vegetables reaches crisis point

The cost of fruit and vegetables in New Zealand is reaching crisis point. Photo / File

EDITORIAL

The extortionate price of supermarket fruit and vegetables has reached a crisis point in New Zealand.

When exasperated shoppers are forced to fork out $3 for a single tomato and $6 for feeble cucumbers, and grocery retailers shrug and say times are tough, something needs to give.

In a time when the nation is battling an obesity emergency, the cost of quality food options is putting healthy eating out of reach for many.

A new study by the University of Auckland found that soaring prices mean our poorest families cannot afford fresh, nutritious and balanced spreads.

It is now “virtually impossible” for families on a benefit to feed their children healthily, giving them the vitamins, minerals and fibre they need, it found.

More than half of our Pacific kids fall into the category of obese or overweight.

Recent research published in the New Zealand Medical Journal highlighted that around 50% of Pacific families live in areas of high socioeconomic deprivation, which is where more than half of New Zealand’s fast-food outlets are currently located.

And if the fruit and vege aisles are being stacked with meagre offerings at prices above less-healthy alternatives a few rows over, what options does that leave families?

Foodstuffs chief executive Chris Quin says he’s acutely aware of how much the weekly supermarket shop has been hitting people in the back pocket over the past two years of high inflation.

“We understand, and we respect it, and we need to be accountable back to New Zealanders for what’s happening in terms of food prices,” Quin told the Herald’s business editor at large Liam Dann on the Money Talks podcast.

RNZ’s Checkpoint delved into how a supermarket shop these days compares with just two years ago, finding, by way of example, a weekly household shop at a Greenlane Countdown in 2022 cost $238 – with the same items now amounting to $289.

One shopper told the show their children have now been warned “they’ve got to eat baked beans and two-minute noodles”.

The price of half-decent meat – with humble mince even now likely to cost around $15.99 a kilo – is another issue, let alone expensive cleaning products, toiletries and baby items.

As Kiwis shiver through a cold winter where more than a third of New Zealanders put energy prices as a major financial worry and Unleaded 91 petrol is on average $2.64 a litre, surely our supermarkets can help take the edge off fruit and vegetables.

New Zealand grows some of the finest, freshest fruit and veg in the world – and enjoyed a bumper summer growing season – and yet many Kiwis can’t afford to dish them up to their families.

One of Labour’s major election promises last year was to remove the 15% goods and services (GST) tax off fresh and frozen fruit and vegetables.

When they failed to gain re-election, Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi tabled a bill to axe GST from all food – but it failed at its first reading in Parliament.

Yes, the growers, suppliers, distributors and supermarkets need to make a buck, but surely the system should allow for households to dish up colourful, healthy plates that ensure Kiwi kids are well-nourished and well-placed to thrive.