1 dish and plain rice every meal, that's how this family fights rising food prices

AsiaOne ^ | MAY 25, 2022 | Ching Sie Jie

[nickcarraway]

With essential consumer goods like cooking oil becoming more expensive, Singaporeans like housewife Raihan (above) are feeling the pinch. Raihan Ibrahim, The Straits Times file

Housewife Raihan Ibrahim feels the pinch whenever she shops for groceries near her five-room HDB flat in Bedok.

Prices of groceries, lamented this 44-year-old to AsiaOne, has gone up markedly in the last few years, especially cooking oil and butter.

So much so that Raihan came up with a savings hack of her own – by opting for frozen ingredients instead of the more expensive fresh ingredients to cope with rising food prices.

Besides switching to frozen ingredients, Raihan has in her arsenal a more drastic measure, by making her family of four make do with just one dish with rice for every meal.

"We are okay with that. We don’t need two to three dishes [for every meal],” she added.

You see, even before the pandemic, Raihan has been doing this to cut down on her family's grocery bill.

And for good reason too, given today's climate.

Fuelled by higher energy and food cost, Singapore's core inflation jumped to 3.3 per cent year on year in April – the highest level since February 2012.

The core inflation rate, which excludes accommodation and private transport costs, increased from 2.9 per cent in March.

In a CNA report in April, MAS warned that the Russia-Ukraine conflict will have “significant repercussions” on global prices of food, which had already risen to close to record levels before the war.

Egg prices up 32.4 per cent But how exactly does this affect Singaporeans like Raihan when they do their grocery shopping?

To get a better idea of how food prices have increased from pre Covid-19 days, we compared the prices of a few staple consumer items including rice, bread, eggs and cooking oil back in April 2019 to April this year.

This data is from the Consumer Price Index (April 2022) which measures the average price changes over time of a fixed basket of consumption goods and services commonly purchased by the resident households.

From this data, we found out that the prices of the six items we selected have increased between 1.6 to a staggering 32.4 per cent. (See table below)

Consumer item April 2019

April 2022

% increase

Premium Thai rice (Per 5kg)

$13.22

$13.43

1.6%

Ordinary white bread (Per 400g)

$1.72

$1.88

9.3%

Whole chicken, chilled (Per 1kg)

$6.38

$7.21

13% Infant milk powder (Per 100g)

$6.07

$6.31

4%

Hen eggs (per 10)

$2.37

$3.14

32.4%

Cooking oil (Per 2kg)

$6.02

$7.25

20.4%

Before the pandemic in April 2019, the average cost of a bag of premium Thai rice was $13.22 per five kilograms.

The same bag of rice will set you back $13.43 today, a modest 1.6 per cent increase.

The price of cooking oil, on the other hand, has gone up nearly 21 per cent, from $6.02 per two kilograms, to $7.25 today.

This price increase is partly due to the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war, where the Black Sea region accounts for a large proportion of global grain and edible oil supplies, CNA reported in March.

The highest jump goes to eggs – a whopping 32.4 per cent – from $2.37 to $3.14 for a box of 10 eggs.

This price hike is driven mainly by the rising cost of imported chicken feed, egg suppliers from Malaysia and Singapore told the Straits Times in March.

While the price of chicken has seen a modest 13 per cent increase, it is expected to be even more expensive in the future – following Malaysia's move to ban exports of the poultry from June 1.

We still have to buy

Before the pandemic, Raihan, with a $50 budget, would be able to buy one item from the list above with $14.22 to spare.

Today, with the price increases, she would only be left with $10.78 now, a drop of 24 per cent in savings.

Going forward, it seems that there may be little respite for Singaporeans like Raihan, as MAS and MTI said that core inflation is forecast to pick up further in the coming months, reported the Straits Times on May 22.

This will moderate towards the end of the year as some of the external inflationary pressures recede, they said.

Despite the jump in prices of food items, Raihan told AsiaOne that consumers like her are left with "no choice since these items are essential".

"Whether they increase the price or not, we still have to buy," she said.

To help tide over the global rise in prices, all Singaporean households can collect $100 worth of Community Development Council (CDC) digital vouchers, which they can spend at more than 16,000 participating heartland merchants and hawkers.

$200 in vouchers will be disbursed in early 2023, and another $200 in 2024, with major supermarkets roped in for the next two years, the Straits Times reported.

[markomalley]

1 SGD = 0.73 USD

Second point, Singapore Isa city-state and imports virtually everything. Consequently, EVERYTHING is as expensive as s***.

For example, the article said that a 5kg bag of Thai jasmine rice is SGD13. Here is the cost of a 5KG bag of Thai Jasmine Rice in Thailand (at a relatively expensive grocery store):

THB209 is a little more than USD6.13.

And that's an expensive price (I've never in my life paid more than about USD4 for a 5kg bag of rice)

Inflation caused by Biden's policies and the impact on the world has hit here too...but Singapore is a special case.

In most of the rest of SE Asia, even though prices are high, it's nothing like Singapore.

[Extremely Extreme Extremist]

Remember that Merry Melodies cartoon where there’s barren cabinets then a single bean is found and they fight over it?

[This_Dude]

Just bought a $67 brisket, $16 pork ribs, $33 bacon, and $28 ground beef.

[Eagles6]

Here in flyover country, southwest PA:

2020 2022
Heating oil $2.00 $5.00
Gasoline $1.85 $4.69
Boneless
Chix breast $1.99 $2.99
Hunt’s pasta $0.99 $1.25
Sauce
Walmart wheat
Bread $1.99 $2.19

[Robert DeLong]

Is it racist to say I prefer yellow rice to white rice? 🙂

[bigbob]

maybe they need to cook without frying every damn thing in oil.

[winterystorm]

Ask the the rice, There is Brown Rice,
Spanish Rice and Black Rice.

Many more if you look.

[bgill]

No, eggs doubled in price overnight a couple months ago.

Good thing this lady’s family doesn’t have diabetes with all that rice eating.

One side dish at each meal? Guess she doesn’t allow for leftovers or letting her family pick their favorite leftover at the end of the week. Sounds like if mama ain’t happy, nobody is.

[bgill]

If only they’d found that one bean a couple months earlier and planted it so they’d have a whole pot of beans.

[jmacusa]

I’m partial to brown rice.

[JohnnyP]

My go-to is beef shank. Roasted then braised. I pull it apart and let it sit in the broth. I eat everything but the bone.

[moovova]

Just bought a beef loin at Sam’s for $113 + tax. Cut it up into 14 decent size steaks. Not a cheap meal for the two of us...but good meat...and far cheaper than eating out.

(I also bought bulk burger packs and will convert that into patties, meatloaf and chili meat to offset the expense of the filet. Chicken and ribs abound in the freezer!)