Household food basket price up again, but slightly less than a year ago

The monthly household food basket cost more in January than it did in December, but the price was at least slightly cheaper than in January 2025. This survey shows how the majority of South Africans struggle to put nutritious food on the table instead of just trying to afford basic staples. The Pietermaritzburg Economic Justice and Dignity Group tracks the prices of food that low-income consumers buy with the help of women who live in low-income communities at stores where they shop for their own families.

They track the prices of 44 basic foods from 47 supermarkets and 32 butcheries in Johannesburg (Soweto, Alexandra, Tembisa and Hillbrow), Durban (KwaMashu, Umlazi, Isipingo, Durban CBD, Hammarsdale and Pinetown), Cape Town (Khayelitsha, Gugulethu, Philippi, Langa, Delft and Dunoon), Pietermaritzburg, Mtubatuba (in northern KwaZulu-Natal) and Springbok (in the Northern Cape). The household food basket survey for January shows that the average cost of the basket was R5 401.44, R67.99 (1.3%) more than in December and R32.26 (-0.6%) less than in January 2025. This chart shows how the food prices in the household food basket changed over the past year: The household food basket survey shows that of the 44 food items tracked in the basket, 26 food items cost more, while 17 food items cost less and one food item’s price remained unchanged.

Food items in the household food basket which cost more than 5% more include: potatoes (15%), onions (15%), frozen chicken portions (5%), soup (7%), carrots (8%), spinach (16%), cabbage (6%) and Cremora (7%). The food items in the household food basket which cost between 2% and 5% more were rice (3%), salt (4%), Maas (2%), eggs (4%), chicken gizzards (4%), beef (2%), beef tripe (2%), apples (4%), margarine (2%), peanut butter (2%) and polony (4%). The only food items in the household food basket that cost more than 5% less were chicken feet (-6%) and green pepper (-10%) while sugar beans (-3%), samp (-3%), wors (-4%), butternut (-4%), canned beans (-3%) and bananas (-4%) cost between 2% and 5% less.