Falling food inflation is at risk of reversing in 2024 as new EU border checks could impose additional costs on UK businesses, industry bosses have warned.
According to the latest figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS), inflation slowed by more than expected to 9.2% in November driven by easing price rises of grocery staples such as pasta, milk and butter.
However, British Retail Consortium chief executive Helen Dickinson told The Telegraph that UK retailers are facing “new border checks for EU imports, hundreds of millions more on business rates bills from April”.
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She said that the government should “think twice before imposing new costs on retail businesses that would not only hold back vital investment in local communities, but also push up prices for struggling households,” however added that supermarkets will do “all they can to keep prices down in 2024”.
The latest BRC figures found that shop price inflation remained static last month at 4.3%, while price rises eased across the fresh and ambient food categories.
Dickinson attributed the fall in food inflation for the eighth consecutive month in December to “retailers’ efforts to bring down prices in the run-up to Christmas.”
In the lead up to festive celebrations, Iceland offered a range of frozen vegetables and fresh produce for 1p and Asda lowered the price of some of its vegetables to 15p.
In a bid to make budgets go further following the expensive Christmas period, Morrisons has locked the prices of over 1,000 items for the next eight week and cut the prices of 200 products by an average of 20%.
Aldi UK CEO Giles Hurley has also pledged to keep prices low throughout the coming year as he said: “As we look ahead to 2024, our promise to customers is that they will always make significant savings on every shop with Aldi because we have the lowest grocery prices in Britain.”
