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Farm Bureau’s Market Basket survey measures minor change since the end of 2009
MADISON – Wisconsin’s largest farm organization tracks the retail price of 20 food items in 26 communities. The Market Basket survey found the average cost of those 20 items in the first quarter of 2010 (Q1) was $52.90. The change in average cost is an increase of $1.41 from the fourth quarter of 2009 (Q4) average of $51.49.
Dairy prices saw modest changes in Q1 of 2010. A gallon of whole milk cost $2.97 or 24-cents more than in the last quarter of 2009. Prices paid to farmers had seen some recovery since early 2009 and as of February of this year, farmers received $16.10 per hundredweight (cwt). A cwt is a hundred pounds of milk and contains 11.5 gallons. That equates to farmers getting $1.40 per gallon. The retail milk price includes processing and transportation. Wisconsin set a new milk production record in 2009 with 25.2 billion pounds of milk produced. In January of 2010, Wisconsin famers produced more milk than the previous January. The price paid to farmers dropped in March of 2010. This month, farmers were paid $14.90 per cwt. With the price paid to farmers on the decline and dairy herd sizes increasing along with production, retail prices should not see much increase or may actually decline heading to the next quarter of 2010. A pound of butter increased just 8-cents in Q1 to $2.56 and the retail price for a pound of cheddar cheese decreased 6-cents to $3.88.
Retail meat prices also saw no large changes. A pound of ground sirloin cost $3.68 in Q1, an increase of 16-cents from the previous quarter. A pound of sirloin tip roast was up 38-cents in the same period, to a price of $3.85. A pound of bacon was up only 1.3 percent with a retail price of $4.21 per pound and pork chops increased 5.5 percent to $3.39 per pound. The only pork product to see a decline was a pound of ham which was down 7-cents from the previous quarter with a retail price of $2.02.
The item with the largest single percent increase in any Market Basket item was sugar. The average retail price for a four pound bag of sugar was $2.63. This is an increase of 19 percent from the Q4 price of $2.21. The Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA) attributes the increase to high prices in the world market. The SRA added that there is currently a 9-13 million ton shortage of the commodity in the world market.
A dozen large eggs saw a small increase in the Q1 retail price. A dozen eggs cost $1.43 in first quarter, up from the Q4 2009 price of $1.31. In 2009, Wisconsin ranked 18th nationally in egg production with 1.35 billion eggs according to the USDA. That was an increase of 11 percent from 2008. Iowa ranked number one in egg production for 2009 with 14.5 billion eggs.
The biggest factor in retail prices going forward is energy, according to a spokesman for the Wisconsin Farm Bureau Federation. “Fuel and energy prices have been stable for about a year since falling from the high levels seen in 2008. If fuel prices remain flat, retail prices should remain stable. Inversely, if fuel price trend upwards, it has an immediate impact on retail food prices. We saw this in 2008 when higher processing and transportation costs were passed on to the consumer.”
