Agricultural price indices data released by Eurostat show that the recent price growth of agricultural commodities in the EU slowed sharply in the second quarter of 2023 when compared with the same quarter of 2022, while prices continued to increase at the same rate in Cyprus.
Meanwhile, the average price of goods and services currently consumed in agriculture (input not related to investment) declined between Q2 2022 and Q2 2023 in the EU, the first decrease since Q4 2020. In this case, indices for Cyprus showed a significant slowdown.
According to Eurostat, these latest data suggest a further settling down of global agricultural markets after a period of disruption, which was characterised by strong agricultural output and input price growth.
Between the second quarter of 2022 and the second quarter of 2023, the average EU price of agricultural products as a whole (output) increased by 2%. This represented a significantly lower rate of increase compared with the previous quarter when the average price increased by 17% (first quarter of 2023 compared with the first quarter of 2022).
In Cyprus, the average price of agricultural products between Q2 2022 and Q2 2023 increased by 13%. This average had also increased on an annual basis in the previous quarter by 13% (between Q1 2022 and Q1 2023).
The sharpest price rises in the second quarter of 2023 among the main groups of output products in the EU were for citrus fruit (an average +89%), olive oil (+48%), and potatoes (+38%). These price rises largely reflected drought-affected volumes. Among other products, it is also worth highlighting the strong price rises for eggs (+31%) and pigs (+28%). By contrast, the price of cereals decreased (- 31%), whilst those of poultry (+4%) and milk (-2%) remained more stable.
In Cyprus, the sharpest rises were recorded in fresh vegetables (an average +38%), pigs (+31%) and vegetables and horticultural products (+29). There were also increases for citrus fruit (+27%) and milk (+20%). Meanwhile, there was a decrease in the price of potatoes (-30%) and cereal (-10%), while prices for eggs (+1%), fruits (-1%) and poultry (-3%) remained more or less stable.
Over the same period, the average price of goods and services currently consumed in agriculture (input not related to investment) in the EU decreased by 5%. This decline followed on from a slowdown in price growth in the previous quarter, albeit when prices increased by 11% (first quarter of 2023 compared with the first quarter 2022).
In Cyprus, these average prices remained stable by showing an increase of merely 0.2% between Q2 2022 and Q2 2023, marking a slowdown compared to the previous quarter when there was an increase of 15% (from Q1 2022 to Q1 2023).
Among the inputs not related to investment, the sharpest rates of price decline in the EU were fertilisers and soil improvers (-23%), energy and lubricants (-13%), and animal feeding stuffs (-5%).
In Cyprus however, prices increased for fertilisers and soil improvers (+40%) and electricity (+5%), and dropped for animal feeding stuffs (-4%) and energy and lubricants (-3%).
At the national level, a majority of EU countries (17 out of 27) continued to experience price increases in agricultural products in the second quarter of 2023 compared with second quarter of 2022.
The fastest rates of increase were recorded in Portugal (+22%), Greece (+21%) and Spain (+16%), countries that experienced drought conditions, with Cyprus coming fourth with +13%. In contrast, Lithuania (-26%) and Estonia (-15%) recorded the sharpest price declines.
Regarding inputs not related to investment, the sharpest rates of increase in average prices compared with the second quarter of 2022 were reported in Hungary and Romania (both +6%), while Lithuania and the Netherlands registered the steepest rates of decline (both -16%).
Source: Cyprus News Agency