To help consumers calculate in advance the cost of typical meals during these dates and buy the products that are most cost-effective, the Organization of Consumers and Users (OCU) has republished its price analysis of the Christmas basket. A couple of weeks ago the first control was made public, where the organization observed a maintenance in the cost of these products compared to last year, but also that the majority of the most consumed foods during the holidays were at "historical highs."
"It will be one of the most expensive Christmases," the organization stated then, which with the results of the first analysis was not at all optimistic. Now, the OCU has published the conclusions of the second price collection, where it has analyzed the cost of Christmas products such as suckling lamb, veal round, pularda or turkey after the December long weekend, that is, less than two weeks until the 25th. And the results are no more encouraging.
In the two weeks that have passed since the first OCU intake, prices have risen, on average, 4.3%. The biggest increases occur in barnacles (21%), clams and hake (20% more expensive now), and to a lesser extent, oysters (9%), sea bass (7%) or Iberian ham (3% ). Other products have hardly changed in price, such as round, pularda, turkey or prawns. Among the decreases, the most notable are those of red cabbage and pineapple, 6% cheaper.
In this second price collection, the OCU also concludes that Christmas foods around December 10 are more than 47% more expensive than on December 10, 2015. And in the case of some products such as clams and/or sea bream the increase is even greater, well above 100%.
Lamb has become more expensive by around 50% in these 9 Christmas seasons, and red cabbage by almost 40%. Prawns, sea bass and to a lesser extent, roundfish, have maintained more balanced prices throughout this time, around a 10% increase, the organization points out.
It remains to be seen if the trend will continue in the next OCU analysis, but it does not seem that with Christmas around the corner prices will go down.
The foods analyzed for this study were suckling lamb to be roasted in quarters, veal round, pularda, turkey, Iberian ham, red cabbage, pineapple, sea bream, farmed sea bass, sliced hake, eels, cooked prawns, Galician barnacles, clams and oysters, and pomegranate.
And to collect prices, the organization has visited markets, supermarkets and hypermarkets in Albacete, Barcelona, Bilbao, Madrid, Seville, Valencia, Valladolid and Zaragoza, Málaga and Murcia.
The information has been prepared by a team of engineers, economists, lawyers, statisticians, editors and designers from OCU who, in collaboration with independent laboratories, have analyzed the main consumer products and services since 1975.
