Loadshedding pushes the food and non-alcoholic beverage inflation to 13.4%

Statistics South Africa said on Wednesday that the food and non-alcoholic beverage inflation is now setting at 13.4% and this is the highest it has been for 14 years (2009-2023)

The push has been fuelled by the failures of Eskom with the increase in blackouts. These failures will now affect all south African citizens whether rich or poor when it comes to the purchase of food.

Pick n Pay a South African retail giant said in its 2022 annual report that load-shedding including the cost of running and maintaining diesel generators significantly increased its operating costs. The retail giant revealed that it spent an additional R346 million year-on-year on diesel to run generators at stores in the first ten months of the year. It looks like Eskom has no plans on fixing the problem it has on its hands.

It will now be a bit harder for the South African retail giants to find ways to maximums profits and still maintain low prices that will retain consumers. Adding on to the problems is that The Bureau for Economic Research said in January that the Average inflation expectations for the year stand at 6.1%.

I believe this will lead to consumers borrowing from financial institutions in terms of credit cards just to fill up the bucket to last till the next payday.