Canadians Panic As Food Prices Soar On Collapsing Currency
It was just yesterday when we documented the continuing slide in the loonie, which is suffering mightily in the face of oil’s inexorable decline.
As regular readers are no doubt acutely aware, Canada is struggling through a dramatic economic adjustment, especially in Alberta, the heart of the country’s oil patch. Amid the ongoing crude carnage the province has seen soaring property crime, rising food bank usage and, sadly, elevated suicide rates, as Albertans struggle to comprehend how things up north could have gone south (so to speak) so quickly.
The plunging loonie “can only serve to worsen the death of the 'Canadian Dream'" we said on Tuesday.
As it turns out, we were right.
The currency's decline is having a pronounced effect on Canadians' grocery bills.
As Bloomberg reminds us, Canada imports around 80% of its fresh fruits and vegetables. When the loonie slides, prices for those goods soar. "With lower-income households tending to spend a larger portion of income on food, this side effect of a soft currency brings them the most acute stress" Bloomberg continues.
Of course with the layoffs piling up, you can expect more households to fall into the "lower-income" category where they will have to fight to afford things like $3 cucumbers, $8 cauliflower, and $15 Frosted Flakes.
As Bloomberg notes, James Price, director of Capital Markets Products at Richardson GMP, recently joked during an interview on BloombergTV Canada that "we're going to be paying a buck a banana pretty soon."
Have a look at the following tweets which underscore just how bad it is in Canada's grocery aisles. And no, its not just Nunavut: it from coast to coast:
Three bucks. For a cucumber. pic.twitter.com/xGkygxkxqB
— Steve Ladurantaye (@sladurantaye) January 12, 2016
If the CAD $ gets any weaker we might be able to buy groceries with shiny rocks #Canada
— Josh Landine (@joshlandine) January 12, 2016
@sladurantaye Heh. Had a similar reaction when I saw the price of cauliflower. Welcome to the future… pic.twitter.com/fxloxyePY3
— Craig Saila (@saila) January 12, 2016
The cost of Tide detergent in Nunavut: pic.twitter.com/2t2xA1EmYk
— themsteri (@teririch) December 31, 2015
And while some Canadians might think this is a regional phenomenon ...
... folks in the northern parts of the Great White North do have the most cause to cry foul:
No "Jack Nasty" it's not The Great Depression, but as we highlighted three weeks ago, it is Canada's depression and it's likely to get worse before it gets better. "Last year, fruits and veggies jumped in price between 9.1 and 10.1 per cent, according to an annual report by the Food Institute at the University of Guelph," CBC said on Tuesday. "The study predicts these foods will continue to increase above inflation this year, by up to 4.5 per cent for some items."
If you thought we were being hyperbolic when we suggested that if oil prices don't rise soon, Canadians may well eat themselves to death, consider the following from Diana Bronson, the executive director of Food Secure Canada:
"Lower- and middle-class people — many who can't find a job that will pay them enough to ensure that they can afford a healthy diet for their families" — also feel the pinch of rising food prices"
"The wrong kind of food is cheap, and the right kind of food is still expensive."
In other words, some now fear that the hardest hit parts of the country may experience a spike in obesity rates as Canadians resort to cheap, unhealthy foods. As we put it, "in Alberta it's 'feast or famine' in the most literal sense of the phrase as those who can still afford to buy food will drown their sorrows in cheap lunch meat and off-brand ice cream while the most hard hit members of society are forced to tap increasingly overwhelmed food banks."
And the rub is that there's really nothing anyone can do about it.
Were the Bank of Canada to adopt pro-cyclical measures to shore up the loonie, they would risk choking off economic growth just as the crude downturn takes a giant bite out of the economy - no food pun intended.
(59 votes)
»
- Login or register to post comments
- Printer-friendly version
- Send to friend
- advertisements -
All hell will break loose when they raise the price of beer in Canada...
US markets (PPT) would love to import some of those nice Canadian hockey sticks.
Are you sure that's possible? It's already 13 bucks for a 6-pack.
I exclusively drink La Fin Du Monde now though. I think the bottles are 666 ml. Cheers, doomers.
These prices are from Nunavut not from big cities
I can confirm that these prices shown are not from big cities, and definitely NOT from Alberta.
Nunavut is north of North Bugfuck, made up of large islands with difficult transport issues in the winter.
Nunavut is not represwentative of the prices found in most of Canukia.
Two cucumbers...for six bucks?...lol.
Cheaper than some boyfriends.
You had to go there didn't you...lmao!
I'd give ya two but I only have one account ;-)
At least you can eat the cucumber when your done.
Well.....depends on where it's been.
It is well known that jews use cucumbers in lieu of sex toys, as they can resell the cucke after use.
And you even get a "Green" orgasm, no batteries required with a cucumber... Such a low carbon footprint, except for all the heavy breathing...
Al Gore approves.
Algore can sit on it.
Can???
No...
Algore already sits on it.
What do you think is up his arse as he struts about?
A cucumber butt plug.
Plus they don't tattle. And they will still respect you in the morning.
They don't complain when you use too much teeth.
just not as smooth !!!
menage et trois with two?
I larphed out loud, good one
Sure, but when they're sliced wafer thin, it seems like four.
Well hell, they could feed five starving families of Syrian refugees on that!
(Ducking) ;-)
Uh, they only eat airplane food.
Ya slice em thin so they come out like a slot machine!
They look like the "organic" cucumbers they sell here in Louisiana. Organic is allegedly pesticide free, and uses natural fertilizer...like Mexican crap. Thus, "organic," is more expensive than the regular ones.
Eight bucks for eggs?! Holy smokes, I would throw chickens in my backyard or a closet. Another great reason not to be in an HOA...lol
K this article is total horseshit - you do realize all those items after the frosted flakes are in the NWT. Please use a fucking map and see that its at the end of the earth. Canada has been fucking them people before the loonie tanked. Please ZH stop the click baiting, you have a greater purpose.
You can buy 2 eskimoes for 5 bucks in Hull.
That is only true if ISIS are in Hull...
I sit in Montreal as we speak. Let us just say the mood is somber. However, for the yanks here, the inflated dollar makes life very pleasant. I wonder how much eggs will cost back in the U.S. When the dollar goes bust.
What are you talking about? Unless you live in Montreal N./St Michel where the few bad crowds are, the rest of the city is booming. I live and work downtown (Golden Sq Mile) and it's never been better here. Quit your bitching and make something with your life, my taxes are increasing thanks to Trudeau and i guess people like you should be thankful for this.
Sorry about your taxes bro. I will get right to work on making something of myself once I finish my cocktail in the P Suite at St-Jean. Love what you guys have done with the looney, btw. Really helps my purchasing power here.
Yeah, now I can afford to go skiing in Banff again if it ain't overwhelmed with tourists and pollution.
Hey what are the cops like in Quebec.
Canadians are always portrayed as these gentle kindly neighbors in the north.
The f***king cops in Toronto are nasty f**ks. There was some G7 or other BS meeting in Totonto a few years ago and the cops were mega thugs. Real AH as opposed to the left Vancounver pols and cops who let some dumb kids trash the downtown.
The lefty cities in America were the worst ones in beating the hell out of those kids and people protesting banksters and Wall Street. Oakland cops and others were horrible.
Montreal? Where the Quebecios pinch nickels and dimes so tight they scream. I generally like all Canadians but Quebecios - not so much.
And that f**king accent when they speak English.
BTW - I have also met some very nice people from Quebec.
their pigeon french is worse. go to quebec city. they are civilized. montreal is a great city, especially when the loony is cheap. i'll be there is summer. i hope the loony collapse recruits some fresh hookers in a sugar daddy way.
Are you going to separate? That would make our drive to Toronto shorter.
English cucumbers, in December? Oh, the frozen ones.
Although the weakening dollar has driven up food prices quite a bit here in Canada, showing prices from the North West Territories and Nunavut is alarmist, and is no way reflective of food prices for the rest (99.999%) of Canada. It would be like going to buy veggies in a grocery store in Alaska, and exclaiming that everyone in the USA all have to pay those prices. I can remember a pound of cheddar costing $7 in Alberta 8 years ago, when it was still $3 in southern Ontario. There is a VERY high cost of living in the far north in Canada, but it only accounts for less than 1% of the population. This article is misleading at best.
I hope that fake Alaskan bush family with weird accents like English stage actors are not starving in Alaska. Two of the grifters went to jail for trying to get those Alaskan oil dividend checks.
The old man has a Texas accent while his supposed children sound like Gielgud or Lord Larry Olivier.
Alaskan Bushwhackers... nice post freddie
Considering their fucked up teeth, British actors is a good bet
Looks like I will be smuggling a Uhaul worth of Tide to Canada. 2 for $55. (I only pay $7 when the wife clips those coupons !!!)
Sell them fake Tide and up your margins. What a world we live in where even laundry soap is counterfeit.
To sell your Tide in community of the store pictured in this misleading article, you would have to fly it on a charter THOUSANDS of miles north of the U.S. border, as there are no roads to the arctic circle (except the odd ice road). Look up Nunavut on Google maps.
thanks tylers for this thread...thanks to canadians posting that these prices are for the NW territory, yep, but I gotta ask :
you think the economy of the world is great as the FED and Obuma tell us?
or do you think we are headed for the life style of the far north?
looking around so many are willing to stay asleep, eyes wide shut.
the drop in the loonie would scare anyone who is awake.
the propaganda is sooo good that many still think we have an economy and a bountiful future.
recovery is just around the corner.
wake the fuck up.
Thank god Canada avoided the horrors of deflation.
Comments like this, the reason I come to zero hedge!
Those prices are not dissimilar to Alaska or Hawaii. Say it with me....Jones Act.
Silly Canadians, they forgot to Hegemoniclaly adjust for product improvements. Those frosted flakes areas probably new and improved. No inflation there