Our EconData platform provides detailed consumer price index (CPI) and CPI weight data, including 8-digit CPI, which includes grouping such as a ‘loaf of white bread’. Today’s post by Jan-Hendrik Pretorius shows that instant coffee is over 85% more expensive than it was in January 2020. Official CPI estimates are broadly in line with an average of five brands of instant coffee based on proprietary data from PriceProbe. Global coffee prices, converted to rands, have however increased much less than domestic instant coffee prices. There are many possible reasons, including much lower inflation in other components of domestic retail prices, hedging or stockpiling by importers, margin adjustments by retailer, or quality adjustments by producers, or shifts to cheaper sources of coffee.
