"Golden basket": the rise in food prices turned out to be total

According to finanz.ru, in the week ended November 22, the overwhelming majority of basic food products in Russia from the mandatory list became more expensive.

“Basic foodstuffs continue to rise in price rapidly in Russia, increasing the pain of consumers who live in mass for less than 30 thousand rubles a month,” the message says.

In annual terms, prices for the main types of meat (beef, chicken and pork) increased by 14.61%, 31.13% and 15.92%, respectively. Since the beginning of the year, buckwheat and flour have grown by 21.02% and 11.29%, respectively.

Eggs rise in price by about 1% every week, their annual growth has already reached 26.98%. Despite the “price freeze” for sugar, this product continues to rise in price, the cost of which in 2020 increased by 70%, and since the beginning of the month - by another 1.9%. Cabbage has grown in price by 98.91%, potatoes by 72.68% over the year.

Over the month, Rosstat's grocery basket has risen in price by 0.85%, and over the year - by 10.54%.

Experts call such a picture “absolutely dramatic”: all food in the country is becoming more expensive, and the rise in prices looks total.

This rate of rewriting of price tags in the stores of the country has not been seen since December 2015, and the rate of acceleration of inflation is hitting record values since 2014. It is expected that by January 1, all the most pessimistic forecasts for inflation will be broken and it will exceed the 8% per annum level.

In such a situation, the Central Bank will have no choice but to raise the key rate by 1 percentage point at once, to 8.5% per annum, and during 2022 it may reach 9.75%, experts predict.

In the context of a total rise in the price of food, citizens with low incomes, who spend most of the money they earn on food, are in the most vulnerable situation. According to opinion polls, today two-thirds of the country's population is in financially constrained conditions. With such a scale of impoverishment, people began to pin their hopes for improving the situation with direct financial assistance from the state. A number of regions have already started talking about the introduction of food ration cards for the poor.