The prices for peppers, spring onions and asparagus are currently higher than they have been for a long time.
You can find out why that is here.
Perhaps you have already noticed when shopping in the supermarket: The prices for peppers *, asparagus and spring onions have recently been well above the usual level.
As many users on the Internet report, a kilogram of paprika currently costs up to 8.99 euros, a bunch of spring onions around 1.25 euros.
For comparison: At the beginning of the year, the average price for 1 kilogram of paprika was 2.56 euros.
In calendar week 14 already at 7.12 euros - an increase of 178 percent!
At the turn of the year, however, you had to pay 65 cents for a bunch of spring onions.
So the price has almost doubled.
Is the corona crisis solely to
blame for
the
high vegetable
prices?
Also read:
Up to 92 percent: These foods have become more expensive in the Corona crisis.
Effects of Corona on the cultivation of fruits and vegetables
The increased prices for peppers and spring onions, for example, can be explained by two effects, reports Hans-Christoph Behr, who
monitors the supply chains for fruit and vegetables
at the
Agrarmarkt Informations-Gesellschaft (AMI)
.
One reason is the high level of personnel required during the harvest: Most of the fruit and vegetables are still harvested by hand.
Both in Germany and in southern European countries,
seasonal workers from abroad
are used for this purpose.
Due to the corona pandemic, farms have to pay attention to hygiene and distance rules during harvest, which leads to lower productivity and longer harvest times.
The additional costs for masks, gloves, rapid tests, etc. must also be offset, which means that customers pay extra.
Yesterday Rewe wanted € 8.99 / kg for peppers.
What usury!
Left them lying around too ... pic.twitter.com/91l0Lg759r
- ❌Mike Nagel❌ (@LassUnsNageln) April 11, 2021
The
asparagus harvest
is doing similarly
this year.
Due to the corona pandemic, there is a shortage of workers, but the bad weather also prevented the popular poles from growing and made harvesting difficult.
The lower supply ensures extremely high prices for the Germans' favorite spring vegetables, as reported by 24garten.de *.
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This is how it continues for the catering industry.
Bad weather drives up vegetable prices
The
bad weather
also leads Behr as the second reason for the current exorbitant prices for certain vegetables.
Many of the peppers currently offered in German supermarkets come from Spain or Morocco, because the German harvest is only gradually ripe in greenhouses.
Bad, cold weather has recently prevailed in Spain and North Africa.
Due to the unseasonal weather, the pepper plants in Spain grew more slowly, which meant that the harvest was smaller.
Shorter supply means higher prices.
According to the AMI, similar observations were made for
tomatoes, cucumbers, spring onions and aubergines
, but in some cases less pronounced.
Normally, the discounters can use their market power to determine and reduce prices when shopping - but not when the global supply is scarce - as it is now, reports Behr according to
T-Online.de
: Now “it is the manufacturers who, due to the high demand can demand higher prices. ”Consumers will probably have to live with the high prices for a few more weeks until the vegetables are also ready to be harvested in German and Dutch greenhouses, which means that supply rises again and
prices fall
.
(mad) * Merkur.de and 24garten.de are offered by IPPEN.MEDIA.
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List of rubric lists: © Fleig / Eibner press photo via www.imago-images.de