When you look at fresh food prices over the past ten years or so, a pattern emerges whereby there are large vairiences in the prices we pay at the check out.

At present cabbages are as cheap as 69 cents, can be $7.00, apples 89 cents, can be $5.00, onions 99 cents, can be $3.00, carrots 39 cents, can be $3.00. Probably the only stand out exception is fish.

Now given that labour costs, delivery costs, packaging, advertising and compliance costs have all risen, how then can these industries remain viable going forward if the consumer will not pay a fair price, every time.

Many industries are about to be slugged with penalty rates with the new IR laws, fruit pickers as an example.

I see one of two things will happen.
1. Prices will increase and stay dear
2. Our growers will fail and we will import most of our goods, in which case we will all suffer.

As a meat retailer I have access to meats from all over the country. My wholesale prices vairy up to 40% at times, which is little comfort for the people growing our products, yet, the cost of getting a beast from the sale to the abb has gone from $4.00 to $15 in ten years. Like fruit, production and associated casts have all risen, so who is missing out.

At present the grower and the retailer are the only ones who's margins get cut. Is this fair?

One possible solution is to stop sending money overseas as aid and send our excess food instead. At least this way our retail prices could stay more consistent and our growers would be better off and perhaps rely less on hand outs in tough times.

What are your thoughts

Supermarkets have an increasing level of power in the food industry. Farmers have always been and will always be price takers. The only time that will change is when food gets scarce.

Many put the blame at Australia's domination of the grocery industry by the two biggest players Woolies and Coles which (at last reading) make up 80% of the market. There is no or little incentive to discount on this basis. This may change with the introduction of Aldi but it is a shame Aldi is foreign owned.

Food production could be sustainable if we put a tariff on food imports or ban imports of goods we don't need ie. those that can be easily grown in Australia.

The irony is that we are losing ground in the domestic market for food while we import food from overseas (that has to be decontaminated with toxic chemicals) and the prices are no cheaper. The OS markets we lose should we get out of 'free' trade would be amply made up within our own domestic market and countries like Japan where there is little arable land not put down to manufacturing will always be a big food market. Same goes for the Middle East for different reasons.

This is a highly manipulated market and much of the best quality food goes overseas - particularly meat.

We charge premium prices overseas, but then the price hikes are reflected in the substandard meat available to Australian consumers. Remember when lamb, mince and sausages were the cheap meats.

The real winners are not consumers or growers in this scenario - there are powerful interest groups nearly always at distribution level. There are huge spin-off implications when food production is taken out of our hands not only in relation to price but food security and safety.

While we wait for governments to get wiser, we can all get around it by growing our own organic food where possible or buying at locally grown food markets which are springing up all over the place. I pay more for the local fellow's organic grass-fed meat but it tastes so much better and hasn't been sitting in a grainlot for 60-100 days awaiting processing.

The smart nations are those who have not bought into the free trade myth.

in europe the farmers get paid to..not produce..[in zimbabwe they used to be an exporter of food..russia used to be the food bowl[ans soon will be yet again...the same is obvious when you drive throughout aussie...there is plenty of food...the only real problems are monopolists who seek to control supply..[to maximise price]..and those seeking to control seed supply...into gmo manipulated poisen

food is cheap...if it was more expensive..people would chose to grow their own..[and not waste money growing lush lawns,no human can eat

while on the point of meateaters being attacked for eating grass eaters...let the vego/greenies..[wanting to save the world eat the grass]...

and reduce their carbon footprint by breathing less..[and stop their compost heaps generating all that methane into the atmosphere]...its not all cow fart's..methane is a greehouse gas as well..its time you greenie carbon taxers realised your bountyfull poop stinks too

*The smart nations are those who have not bought into the free trade myth.*

So says Pelican, who as a consumer is the first to benefit from
free trade. Cheaper cars, clothes, electronics, various consumer
goods.

Yes we could introduce a tariff on all these things. The result
would be rocketing costs for these things, then Pelican posting
that workers need a payrise to cope with huge inflation!

Sorry Pelican, but Australia has been through all these litle
jokes before and it was a dismal failure.

Not if domestic competition remains free from interference, price fixing or collusion Yabby. The same risks we see in international trade and can be oversighted by appropriate agencies.

And free trade in food has not led to cheaper prices for consumers only larger slices of the pie for distributors.

As a consumer I won't buy certain goods on principle and will pay more for goods that have not been produced using what amounts to little more than slave labour. Neither do I want to buy food that has to undergo toxic spraying just to get onto our shelves.