Food prices flat in September, but supermarket groceries cost 3% more than a year ago

Grocery food prices were 3.0% higher in September than a year earlier, up from a 1.7% annual rise in August. Trading Economics, summarising Stats NZ data, said groceries made the biggest contribution to the rise in overall food prices.

Food prices as a whole didn't move between August and September, after rising 0.3% the month before. Even so, food now costs 2.4% more than it did a year ago, up from 1.9% in August.

That August figure was the smallest annual rise since December 2024, according to Trading Economics. September's was the fastest since June.

Prices haven't risen across the whole trolley. Some sections are cheaper than they were a year ago:

• Fruit and vegetables: down 1.8%, a bigger fall than August's 1.6% drop.
• Milk, cheese and eggs: down 0.6%, compared with 0.3% in August.
• Oils and fats: down 8.1%. That's still a large fall, but smaller than the 10.6% drop in August.

Meat, poultry and fish cost 3.2% more than a year ago, slightly less than August's 3.4% rise. Restaurant meals and ready-to-eat food were up 3.1%, down from 3.2%. Trading Economics said eating out was the second-biggest contributor to the overall rise in food prices.

CPI NZ's latest figures reported inflation running at 3.13% for the month ended 30 September. That figure covers a wider range of goods and services than food alone, but food is a key contributor.

These are the last monthly price figures before Stats NZ publishes the consumers price index for the September quarter on 22 October and the Reserve Bank announces its next Official Cash Rate decision on 28 October.

Trading Economics' own model has food inflation reaching 3.0% by the end of the quarter. That's the company's projection, not an official forecast.