Confectionery products and cookies are at risk of imminent price hikes as the climate crisis sees the global cost of sugar soar.
Extreme weather, such as dry spells in India and drought in Thailand, has threatened crops and delivered underproduction rates from these regions, which are big exporters of sugar.
Last year, in an interview with Bloomberg, Dirk Van de Put, the CEO of Mondelez, which owns confectionery brands such as Oreo cookies and Toblerone chocolates, spoke about the impact of rising sugar costs.
“[There will have to be] straightforward price increase,” for consumers, he said, adding that shrinkflation or reducing product sizes, “won’t solve this inflation at this stage”.
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“While the rest of our input cost is largely flat for next year, those two are really causing us to have to increase prices again,” said Van de Put.
Industry experts also warn that failures to address the ongoing climate crisis mean more extreme weather and risk to sugar crops are in the forecast for the foreseeable future.
International Food Policy Research Institute senior fellow Joseph Glauber told The Guardian: “There’s no question sugar prices are very, very high and will remain high until we see El Niño abate.
“The issue will be affordability. There will be an increased cost of food that will be felt by households, particularly poorer households, but it’s a different story for countries where 40% of expenditures are on food, which will be dramatically affected.
“There is a concern about the impact of climate change in the long run with the movement of cropping areas and higher volatility in the price of things like rice and sugar.”
