What constitutes cheese in the US is different than what constitutes cheese here, similar to the US’s interpretation of the whitish liquid they call milk.
|
|
|
Food prices
- Thread starter nobbie48
- Start date
So what is the real value? I pointed out the price of a breakfast in Ukraine at $2.00. Here that gets you a coffee. Ukraine doesn't have a lot of high rollers so does everyone in the chain back off on their expectations to get those prices?
Street food in third world countries (If it doesn't kill you) can't be pricey. You see the charity ads where they implore you to feed a person for a dollar a day and we can't do that here with the food on our doorstep.
A guy from Guiana was looking at getting into fish farming when he retired from here (Tilapia) but he could at the time 10+ years ago have purchased tilapia for ten cents a pound in bulk. He would need a distribution system and freezer storage space.
That's an apples to ceiling fans comparison.
Unlike a highly regulated country like Canada, the restaurant in the Ukraine has far less overhead to contend with: permits, inspections, insurance, rent, relatively higher wages paid out to staff, higher income taxes, etc.
Not to mention these overhead items being added by each organization involved with the production, transport and distribution of all food items.
Last edited:
To cook a traditional Kenyan meal (sukama wiki and Ugali, essentially collard greens and maize flour that tastes like shredded cardboard) costs about a nickel. You e got lot of vitamins from the green and ugali makes you feel full.
I was watching a show on preppers and one used a half-empty covered swimming pool to grow food. The deep end had tilapia, the shallow end had plants. As it heated up in the sin water would evaporate from the deep end and drip off the cover to water the plants. Skimmed the fish poo out for fertilizer. I think they grew some kind of water plant too in with the tilapia. Cool stuff. Smelled bad in the pool.
I think a lot is expectations and layers between production and consumption. I wont touch s job worth less than x as it's not worth the admin hassle for me. That could increase the price of the product unless they find someone to do it cheaper.
Edit:
I should add that $20 a month income put you in the middle class of native Kenyand. Looking at absolute values without looking at relative values doesnt produce reasonable answers
Last edited:
sburns
Well-known member
I have no idea. But I am sure even at the "sale" price, all the business's involved are making money somehow.
The guy from Guiana said the tilapia basically ate weeds. Mow the lawn and throw the clippings in the pond.
We used to go to Ridge Berry Farm occasionally before it closed and they had chickens but were only allowed to sell a few dozen eggs per week outside of the marketing board but IIRC the eggs they used in their meals had to be purchased through the board system.
How many farmer's markets here have produce actually from the farmer. Most are just parking lot retail outlets, fresh Ontario bananas and oranges.
I figure a loaf of focaccia costs me about $2.00 to make and it would retail for $5.00. With my present kitchen I could make about 20 per day = $60 for 8 hours which is half the minimum wage. I'd have to go to ten times that to make it worth thinking about but I'd have to invest hundreds of thousands in equipment and space to get that output.
Then I'd end up selling to a store that would want a discount so the plan would take another dump.
Go big or go home.
I have a crab apple tree and make my own jelly for the price of the sugar when I get a decent crop. If I had to buy apples the math doesn't work.
I haven't even touched on regulations, inspections or licences.
In a small unregulated village one could supplement their income if they grew their own food for processing. It's a long work week. My grandmother did it in rural Manitoba.
Maybe not the last one in the chain. Grocery stores throw out literal dumpsters of food because it passed an arbitrary date or has a mark on it. That cost gets spread into all of the other "overpriced" food. If they sold it all, prices could come down, the business makes the same net and everybody is happy. Producers putting "best before" dates on things that are still good far after is much of the problem.
nyx
Well-known member
Food prices go up every winter. My diet is specific, plus shopping just for me and the lizard, that I haven’t seen increase in all items yet. But it’s coming.
I should be managing my food waste a bit more carefully though. Sometimes I buy stuff on sale or bulk and forget about it until it’s garbage. Very wasteful.
I also think if someone can shop online through delivery that don’t overcharge too much (grocery gateway??), it may be cheaper longer term if avoiding impulse buys. Grocery stores rely heavily on impulse shopping, and some heavy targeting is involved.
I should be managing my food waste a bit more carefully though. Sometimes I buy stuff on sale or bulk and forget about it until it’s garbage. Very wasteful.
I also think if someone can shop online through delivery that don’t overcharge too much (grocery gateway??), it may be cheaper longer term if avoiding impulse buys. Grocery stores rely heavily on impulse shopping, and some heavy targeting is involved.
Only some cheddars are decent…there’s a lot of dross.
Rediculos that farmers are able to make a decent living on Canada they should be in poverty and indebted to large corporations like the US. No way should they be able to afford to own anything.
Sent using a thumb maybe 2
If it wasn't for the "keep it in the family" attitude why wouldn't a farmer take the cash from a developer and relax instead of the 80 hour work weeks?
Livestock has to be the worst with daily attention in many cases.
At the outbreak of the pandemic farmers were in the dark as far as what crops to plant. How were lockdowns going to affect consumption? Waiting until mid summer for an answer wasn't an option.
I don't know how things vary across the country but I was lead to believe that a lot of farmland in southern Ontario is already owned by developers and I assume rented out.
It's a complex subject and not Little House on the Prairie.
Glad to see some logical input. Farmers work long hours, especially with livestock, and the return often isn’t all that amazing. Usually it’s the big distributor (dairy, poultry, etc) making the big bucks. For many farmers it’s a labour of love.
Sent from my iPhone using GTAMotorcycle.com mobile app
Most farms in the gta have been rented or optioned for years. Some I knew about had a high five figure yearly cheque associated. Developer pays market rate when they decide to proceed and don't have millions in capital tied up for decades before they are ready to go.
Mad Mike
Well-known member
I’m guessing you haven’t been to an Ontario chicken or dairy farm.
Ontario chicken and Dairy ranchers aren’t hayseed dirt farmers. They are a savvy group who belong to a cartel that controls prices, contracts, guaranteed profits and virtually zero risk. A small small chicken operation that runs on 2 hours labor a day can kick off $150-200k profit.
Those lucrative subsidies are paid for by consumers every time they down a chicken nugget
Mad Mike
Well-known member
That’s the way it works, farmers don’t keep farms in the family because of farming, they are businesses.
Many family business are passed along, many are not - farming is not unique in this sense.
I’m guessing you have a limited perspective on this topic. Not being contradictory or disrespectful I just have experience from both sides.
Sent from my iPhone using GTAMotorcycle.com mobile app
I have been to lots dairy and chicken farms are the only ones that actually make a fair profit for the investment in time and money. Do you work for less than minimum wage after investing millions in a business? Why should farmers have to? If you look South you see farmers who don't even own the livestock because they can't afford to and are in poverty because the system is so broken there. But you can have slightly cheaper milk and eggs.
Sent using a thumb maybe 2
Mad Mike
Well-known member
My brother is a chicken farmer with a 25k bird quota. He also farms 300 acres of family land and 3200 more of rented land. I have a little visibility into operation and economics.
Quota systems benefits older farm owners, nobody else. There are few businesses the govt guarantees height profit and near zero risk.
So you think it would be preferable if he had to live in poverty and owed everything to a large food company.
Sent using a thumb maybe 2
Somewhere I read that most of the food one sees at a grocery store comes from ten gigantic corporations.
Three or four million will get you about 100 acres up around Shelburne. I have no idea how much the equipment would cost to run a weather dependent business of that size. Unlike a concert or game there are no rain dates if you get a bad month. Not for the faint of heart.
Assume an investment of five million, what would one expect in return considering the risk?
Five percent, a few points above inflation (Depending on who you believe) is $250,000.
The stock market is far more flexible. Hit the sell button and cash in in a few moments if the ground feels shaky.
For me, a few acres to grow my own beans and taters would be the limit but those are often restricted sales.
BTW I worked for a company that packaged potatoes for many of the supermarket chains and the suppliers didn't give the prices to the chains. The chains gave the prices to the suppliers, take it or leave it.
And then there were the kick backs.
|
|
|
|
|