The Household Food Basket in the Household Affordability Index was designed together with women living on low incomes in Johannesburg, Cape Town, Durban ,Springbok and Pietermaritzburg (Pietermaritzburg Economic Justice and Dignity (PEJD)). It is considered a reasonable indicator for a food basket which includes important typical foods households try and buy each month. Data from this is collected from 44 Supermarkets and 30 Butcheries to track the average increase of the food basket.
The household basket is at R4 355,70 per month which is higher than the average salary of a General Worker which is R3 470,40 per month . PEJD estimates that a domestic worker earn about R3 054,40 per month. The same basket has increased by R354,52 per month from previous year (2021). This excludes all other expense such as travel, school fees, health care, etc. In previous weeks I have written about the impact of increase in petrol price and electricity which hasn’t been factored in yet.
The situation sounds dire.
Economics and Finance SA 