Gloomy forecast: 5 euro bread in Hungary is on the way
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Due to the natural gas shortage, the price of fertilisers is stagnating. This might cause a shortage by next year, which will hinder agricultural production. Despite the sharp fall in natural gas prices, company leaders still fear restarting fertiliser factories. The effects of this will be felt by the populace even in August next year. If the supply chain problems continue, bread might become unaffordable.
This issue is not limited to Hungarian agriculture. Fertiliser production halted all over Europe due to uncertain natural gas supplies. Most European governments’ main priority is the security of residential supplies. However, this leaves industrial customers without options to buy their supplies — reports Penzcentrum.hu. The price of natural gas is volatile. While in February 2020 the price of natural gas was 8 euros, in August 2022 this went up to a record 324 euros. This is crucial because 70 percent of the cost of fertiliser production is made up of natural gas purchases.
According to experts, fertiliser production went down with approximately 350,000-400,000 tons so far in one factory alone at Pét. Not even the usual Serbian, Croatian, Romanian or Austrian import sources are available now. Everybody was hoping that factories would restart if natural gas prices fell below 150 euros.
I have to eat Gluten-Free, so my bread was already very expensive. Now it is 1,100 ft for 250grams. I stopped eating bread, it is a matter of principle!
Still has 18% VAT on it, like I choose to eat Gluten-Free…
Hm, I wonder if I should put my artisan bread-baking skills to better use and start home bread-baking classes?