2023’s extreme weather raised olive oil, beef, and blueberry prices

It’s the time of year when many are thinking about food. A lot of food. Thinking a lot about a lot of food.

In 2022, Americans spent an additional $2.8 billion on food for Thanksgiving compared to a typical week. Supply chain disruptions and inflation pushed the cost of a Thanksgiving dinner to record highs, according to a survey from the American Farm Bureau Federation. The survey finds costs are down this year but still higher than they were prior to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Those higher prices are due in part to disruptions in the global food supply, and while overall global production is up, zooming into different countries and regions reveals many people are having a harder time securing their next meal. Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine, a major corn and wheat exporter, is continuing to send shocks into grain markets. Inflation remains high in many countries, further threatening food security.

This year added another spicy ingredient: Some of the hottest temperatures ever recorded on Earth. Extreme heat in 2023 diminished wheat yields in India, while drought took a bite out of rice in Indonesia. Disasters worsened by rising average temperatures also took a toll. Cyclone Freddy tore up fields of corn, rice, and beans across Malawi in March, the brunt borne by small subsistence farms. Severe weather also took a toll on livestock. Heat and drought stressed cattle herds across the US, Heads of cattle were already at their smallest numbers since records began in 1971. It’s even making cows produce less milk.

Still, there’s a lot to be grateful for at the dinner table this year: Farmers have continued to push up crop yields to feed the growing, hungry planet. Technologies like mechanization, improved breeding, genetic engineering, and fertilizer have helped farmers reap more from the land. This year, global grain production is projected to reach an all-time high. In countries like the US, farmers planted more acres of crops like soy, corn, and wheat to take advantage of higher prices. The US is now reaping a record corn harvest.

But that doesn’t necessarily mean big gains for the sowers and reapers. “The percent of a food dollar that goes to the farmer is really small,” said Anne Schechinger, Midwest director for the Environmental Working Group and an agriculture researcher. In 2022, it was less than 15 cents per dollar for US farmers, according to the US Department of Agriculture.

In addition, because there was such a bumper crop of corn and soy, the amount that US farmers are projected to make per bushel is poised to fall. So 2023 has created a situation where consumers are paying more for food but some farmers will get paid less.

Add to that the fact that farms often operate on narrow margins and smaller operations are particularly precarious. More than 90 percent of farms in the US are considered “small,” meaning a farming income of $250,000 or less per year, according to the USDA.

The US government created a crop insurance program in the 1930s to help farmers hedge against forces of nature. The program is government subsidized but run by private companies. Farmers pay a premium and receive a payment if their yields or their revenues fall below a given threshold. The program insures 82 percent of eligible acres. But because a handful of farms hold the biggest tracts, only 20 percent of the total number of farms are covered.

More than 73 percent of federal crop insurance payouts are due to weather: heat, drought, excess moisture, hail, and frost. “Last year had the highest crop insurance payments in the history of the program,” Schechinger said. Payouts totaled $19.13 billion, up from $2.96 billion in 2001, according to the Environmental Working Group. In addition, the USDA is providing more than $3 billion in disaster relief to farmers.

It will take a few more months to tally the insurance payouts this year, but 2023’s raucous weather is already raising the price of what’s on the plate. Here is a sampler platter of the foods scorched, drenched, or dried out from the weather this year, raising prices for stalwart staples and delectable delicacies alike.

Marco Bertorello/AFP via Getty Images

It may be good for your heart, but olive oil’s soaring price this year may give you palpitations. Searing heat and scant rain across the Mediterranean, from Spain to Morocco to Greece to Italy, damaged olives this year, making olive oil more valuable than crude oil. Global olive oil production is projected to fall by half this year.