The price of butter in Italy has more than doubled in the past year (+113%) due to a rise in demand, according to Italian farmers’ association Coldiretti.
Ansa reports that a peak price of €5.04 per kilogram was recorded on the Milan Stock Exchange for the first time in five years, which Coldiretti says is starting to affect other products, such as cream and cheese.
The organisation attributes the rise in demand to consumers' preference for butter instead of palm oil, which is 'being abandoned at a great rate'. However, production has been halved in Italy in recent years as a result of falling prices, with around 30,000 farms currently producing milk for butter, compared to 60,000 in 2005.
Coldiretti describes the situation as 'unsustainable', and says that action needs to be taken to save the 120,000 jobs in this sector in Italy, which generates an annual turnover of €28 billion.
The problem is not limited to Italy, however. Global butter consumption is forecast to climb 3.1% this year, outstripping the 2.5% rise in production, according to the USDA, causing prices to rise across Europe and elsewhere.
© 2017 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article by Francesca Volpe. Click subscribe to sign up for ESM: The European Supermarket Magazine.
