Rising butter prices leave European consumers with a sour taste

Rising butter prices give European consumers and bakers a bad taste

Transcript

00:00In the past year, the price of butter rose by 19% on average across 27 European Union

00:08member states. The increase is a result of a global shortage of milk caused by declining

00:13production. A butter shortage in France in the 19th century led to the invention of margarine,

00:19but some pastry chefs refused to switch to the alternative.

00:24It's as if you were selling a Ferrari and you put a Dacia engine and say it's a Ferrari.

00:30At some point, I think it's not going to work. People are going to see it.

00:35As a result, Del Montelle is forced to make his pastries smaller. The process of trying

00:40to hide food prices by reducing package sizes is something known as shrinkflation. But the

00:45pastry chef said he has no choice as he needs to pay his taxes, his employees as well as

00:51his bills.

01:03And in Central Europe, Poland encountered a price rise of almost 50% in the past year.

01:09The government keeps a stockpile in its country's reserves and said they'll release roughly

01:141,000 tons of frozen butter to stabilize prices.

01:19Meanwhile, Southern European countries rely more heavily on olive oil and are therefore

01:24less affected by the butter inflation.