5 Foods That Are More Expensive Thanks To The Climate Crisis

The cost of living crisis is pinching purses up and down the country, so you may not have noticed some price rises happening for another reason. As the climate crisis worsens, some food products have increased dramatically in price – and they’re still increasing, with prices projected to rise between 0.6 and 3.2 percent by 2060. In fact, experts at the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit say climate change is responsible for a third of all food price inflation. Here are five foods to keep your eye on (and maybe find alternatives for).

The Climate Crisis Is Making These 5 Foods More Expensive

Bananas

New reports have emerged that the climate crisis poses an ‘enormous threat’ to the global banana supply, with Pascal Liu, senior economist at the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation, sharing his fears with the BBC. If you haven’t noticed recent shortages of bananas, it’s because ripening facilities are well equipped to buffer the effects of such shortages by accelerating or decelerating the ripening process. But as the climate crisis continues, bananas are at risk of being wiped out by temperature rises and the faster spread of grave diseases. With fertilisers, energy and transport also increasing in price and the workforce shrinking, the world’s favourite fruit is about to get a lot more expensive.

Olive Oil

As we reported two months ago, olive oil producers are struggling due to changing weather patterns in Spain, Italy, Greece and Portugal. The fragility of olive groves in these arid nations – where temperatures are soaring and flash flooding is increasingly common – means yields have plummeted and prices have increased a staggering 115 percent in Spain between September 2022 and September 2023.

(c) Poojitha Prasad, Unsplash

Hops (aka Beer)

Hops, the plant added to beer during the brewing process, is also falling victim to the climate crisis, with global yield dropping 20 percent between 1971–1994 and again between 1995–2018, with longer and hotter summers only exacerbating the situation in the future. Not only are increased temperatures reducing our hops yield, but they are worsening the flavour, too. Is this the end of the beloved pint?

Chicken & Eggs

Bear with us (we know you can’t grow eggs…). While the global spike of avian flu means chicken and egg prices have leapt up, the climate crisis also played a role in these price spikes. Growing chicken feed has become 30 percent more expensive, meaning the cost of eggs rose by a whopping 60 percent in the US in 2022.

Chocolate

It’s not just the sugar tax bumping up the price of our favourite sweet treat: the climate crisis is also raising the price of chocolate. Prices have already risen 14 percent (between the summers of 2022 and 2023) due to consistent droughts and hurricanes reducing the yield for some of the world’s largest producers, including Ghana and The Dominican Republic. This isn’t just because of the increased price of cocoa beans, though – sugar prices are also on the rise, compounding the skyrocketing prices of chocolate.