BBCRising food costs are seeing families being pushed towards poverty, the chair of Jersey’s shoppers’ rights group has said.
Recent inflation figures for Jersey showed the cost of food went up by 4.1% in 2025.
Carl Walker, chairman of Jersey’s Consumer Council, said all food prices hit islanders hard, however, 4% sounded positive “when you think back to what we had a couple of years ago at 12% in terms of inflation”.
He added: “If you’re earning less, you’re spending more of that wage back on your food items, and if you’ve got children as well, it really does push people very, very close to the breadline at the moment.”
‘Loss of income’
Mr Walker said every day islanders saw food costs rising but there were savings that could be made.
“There are big price differences, even for exactly the same item amongst our few supermarkets in this tiny island and the more people can educate them about those price differences, the better informed they’re going to be and the more money they’ll be able to save.”
A petition to remove the goods and services tax (GST) from food has reached more than 1,000 signatures.
Mr Walker said: “Whilst it seems an obvious win for consumers, the Consumer Council has always been very cautious about backing a move to remove GST off food because ultimately the government would then need to recover that loss of income elsewhere.”
One way Jersey residents have looked to save money has been using the app Olio, which allows people to buy unsold supermarket food at a reduced price.
Natalie Standen, volunteer and user of the app, said prices had “gone through the roof”.
She said she had been a volunteer for eight years and had seen a “huge growth” in use of the app.
“We turn up to the stores, we collect the food, we list it and then anyone and everyone can come and collect a bag of food.”
She said people mostly got bread, salad and bananas.
“Anything that they request that they’re going to use, we’ll have it ready for them and it really is saving families a lot of money.”