Food prices continue to skyrocket and in Sweden prices have increased more than in other Nordic countries. But what is actually behind the development?
Most consumers are well aware of the rising food prices in Sweden, but few perhaps realize how sharply prices are rising right now – and how quickly.
Increased by 2.5 percent in February
The independent site Matpriskollen has measured the prices of food in Sweden since 2015, and according to the site’s founder Ulf Mazur, the price increase in February was the highest they had ever measured.
In the daily goods category, prices increased by 2.1 percent in February, while they increased by 2.5 percent in the food category. This can be compared with the price increase for daily goods in 2021:
“For the whole of 2021, the price increase for daily goods was 1.1 percent. Now it’s twice as much just in February,” Mazur tells us SVT News.
Something that also puts price trends into perspective is how much prices have increased over the past twelve months: 15.2 percent for daily goods and 17.8 percent for the food category.
Increases most in the Nordics
Sweden is remarkably worse off than its Nordic neighbors when it comes to food price increases. Martin Bäckström, unit manager of the Swedish Competition Authority, tells After five that it is not fully known what this is due to:
“Earlier last autumn, we could see that the inflation curves we saw took on slightly different expressions – for example, inflation went up earlier in Denmark, while in Sweden we had a curve that started a little later but was instead a little steeper,” he says.
Bäckström also points out that in Norway, for example, there is a different method for pricing the goods between industry and trade – they negotiate prices twice a year, which gives a different effect.
“From our perspective, the interesting question is, does the competition work? If you have a functioning competition, there are alternatives for the consumers to go to,” he says, adding that a functioning competition also means that “the actors do not pass on more costs to the consumers than is justified.”
