In fact, the war in Ukraine is not the only reason for the shortage that has been observed for weeks.
Throughout the area, several areas of supermarkets become empty or even remain empty. The phenomenon reflects multiple tensions between consumer concerns, war in Ukraine, rising production costs and tough trade negotiations against a backdrop of high inflation.
In the aisles, whether with oils, flour or pasta, the same annoyances: how do you make your cake or mayonnaise without these essential foods?
Industry specialist NielsenIQ notes that product availability has declined since early March, although the trend “to be confirmed in the coming weeks.”
The most heavily penalized categories are oils, followed by frozen potatoes, flour, pasta and eggs.
And according to NielsenIQ, 3.1% of products have been discontinued at some point since the beginning of the year, for an average of 4 days. 60% of these bottlenecks are in the grocery and fresh produce departments.
Cautionary purchases, but not only
For oils, even flour, the precautionary buying phenomenon is in full swing: consumers worried to hear that Russia’s offensive in Ukraine is draining stocks of sunflower oil, of which the country is a major exporter, or of wheat might have decided to anticipate by buying more than usual. The supply chain did not follow.
But that’s not the only factor. In the case of eggs, for example, there are also economic factors, but with the bird flu epidemic, there is also the price of feed.
“70% of the cost of eggs is animal feed,” explains Jean-Philippe André, President of ANIA, the agribusiness association. The latter often come from Russia and Ukraine, “They have a tension in terms of both price and availability.”
This also applies to “meat products,” he continues, particularly because of the inflation of soybean meal used to feed poultry, pigs or beef.
And then the international supply chains were shaken. Russia and Ukraine are “suppliers of aluminium, glass and recycled plastic,” says Jean-Philippe André. Some brewers or manufacturers who use cans “have an order summary within ten days and have to keep changing their supplies.”
When he insists not to “freak out” the French, the agri-food representative calls for “listening and understanding throughout the industry”.
“Rat Race”
Because this is another component of the current tensions: while the annual negotiations between food manufacturers and supermarkets, in which the prices of many products in supermarkets were set for the coming year, ended on March 1, the government decided in the face of this to resume talks stimulate inflation of production costs (e.g. energy, fuel, but also packaging) and agricultural raw materials.
“Today we sell our pigs for 1.90 euros per kilo (instead of 1.40 euros per kilo paid to the breeder in January), but given the increased input costs we are losing money,” said the President of the First Farmers’ Confederation recently, of the FNSEA, Christiane Lambert. “The price increase is a necessity”.
The discussions are “a terrible hamster wheel,” she said, always quick to accuse the supermarkets of wanting to lower prices. Their representatives themselves appear as defenders of the purchasing power of the French, an argument that hits the bull’s eye in the sense that it is now at the heart of their hearts.
The wholesaler’s representative, the general delegate of the FCD, Jacques Creyssel, replied that “a certain number of increases have already been accepted by the brands” and dismissed the suppliers’ criticism.
Michel-Edouard Leclerc, the President of the Strategic Committee of the E. Leclerc Centers, estimated on BFMTV / RMC in the middle of the week that “it is not only the increase in raw materials that explains the increase in prices that we are currently seeing offered”.