With the collapse of international production, the price of extra virgin olive oil rises by 42%, making it the product with the highest price increase in the basket, followed by sugar, which rises by 38%, and potatoes, which rise by 26% as harvests fail and one potato out of four is lost. This is the conclusion of a Coldiretti analysis of Istat data on September inflation, which also shows a significant slowdown in retail prices of vegetables, with the increase reducing from +20.1% last month to +13.8%, compared to a significant stability of fruit, which climbs by +9.6%. The results of the poor harvest abroad weigh on the increase in olive oil prices, particularly in the Iberian Peninsula, which is the world's leading producer and exporter in a situation where 3 out of 4 bottles consumed in Italy are foreign and Italian imports of olive oil from abroad have marked the century's record for a value of over 2.2 billion euros in 2022 with an increase of nearly 20% in the first six months of 2023, according to Istat data. Also for sugar, Italy, with a consumption of over 1.7 million tons, has a production of only 150,000 tons, which has been drastically reduced by the closure of 17 of 19 sugar refineries over the past two decades, with more than four out of five packages arriving from abroad, whose prices affect the entire market.
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