Business

What price the Christmas dinner on your table?

Some of the items on your table this Christmas will have vastly fluctuated in price
Some of the items on your table this Christmas will have vastly fluctuated in price Some of the items on your table this Christmas will have vastly fluctuated in price

CHRISTMAS is a time for family, reflection and celebration. That inevitably means food. So what effect has Brexit had on our Christmas food shop?

Many of the treats we indulge ourselves with at this festive season are imported. In fact, the expense of items such as cinnamon, sugar, figs and dates was such that they were seen as true luxuries and reserved for celebrations such as Christmas.

As the pound has fluctuated wildly since July, this has had an effect on our shopping, especially the imported items. But what does that mean for our Christmas dinner?

Well, according to a recent study by Mintec, analysts predict that many items for your traditional Christmas lunch will cost significantly more in 2016 than they did a year ago.

Indeed a combination of higher import prices and low domestic yields in crops mean that the Christmas pudding could cost 21 per cent more than last year.

Sugar prices are up as we would expect, but this cost is compounded by low milk and wheat crops in the UK. Suddenly those of us that made one last year, allowing it to mature nicely don’t seem so odd.

Home produced veg is up too, we can’t blame Brexit for that. That was down to the good old British weather as we saw crops badly affected by the wet summer.

It’s not all bad news though, for if you favour a big bird for the dinner table, then your turkey could well be 2 per cent lower than last year which was affected by avian flu outbreaks.

Go easy on the forcemeat stuffing and ‘Pigs in Blankets’ however. Poor pork production, low pound and increase in exports to China mean that pork is up 14 per cent.

However, those rises are insignificant compared to the cost of your after dinner coffee and indulgent chocolates that are both going to cost a massive additional 40 per cent this year.

Nonetheless, in amongst all the doom and gloom, it’s still beginning to look a lot like Christmas, and whilst it may cost us a bit more, the value of coming together and celebrating with friends and family is worth far more than the pounds in your pocket.

I can’t promise I won’t use it as a lever to stop the kids eating the last bacon-covered sausage this year though . . . after all, I’m the one that will have paid over the odds for it!

:: Darren McKeever (dmckeever@wwfp.net) is Northern Ireland adviser of Worldwide Financial Planning, which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. For a free, no obligation initial chat about your individual finances, call 028 6863 2692, email info@wwfp.net or click on www.wwfp.net. Follow us on Twitter: @WorldwideFP.