NEW YORK, July 2 Common U.S. breakfast foods have risen as much as 12 percent in the past year, an analysis of U.S. government statistics shows.
An average U.S. grocery bill -- including a pound of ground-roasted coffee, a dozen eggs, a gallon of whole milk, a pound of bacon, a 10-ounce box of corn flakes, a pound of white bread and a can of frozen orange-juice concentrate -- totaled $17.96 this May compared with $16.03 a year earlier, a New York Post analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics data showed.
One reason breakfast is on the rise is because ethanol-fuel production is using up a large chunk of the corn crop, the newspaper said.
This is affecting everything from cereal -- whose price has risen 2 percent this year -- to feed for livestock that become bacon, U.S. Agriculture Department economist Ephraim Leibtag said.
In addition, increased global demand has raised milk's rice while U.S. Midwest droughts have cut wheat production, Leibtag said.
Orange-juice prices have risen because of California freezes and Florida hurricanes of 2004 and 2005, Andrew Meadows of the Florida Department of Citrus told the newspaper.
Copyright 2007 by UPI
