Retail prices for meat jumped in April, with consumers paying record high prices for fresh and choice beef, according to Daily Livestock Report.
Fresh retail beef averaged just over $5.94 a pound for the first three months of the year, then rose 4.4% to $6.22 a pound in April, reaching the highest recorded monthly price for the data series, stated the DLR, citing statistics released Tuesday by the USDA’s Economic Research Service.
In the same vein, the price of choice retail beef increased 6.6% in a month to hit its highest recorded monthly price of $6.44 a pound in April, the DLR stated.
Consumers are also paying more for pork this year than last, with that upward trend showing no signs of abating. The retail price of pork was up 1.2% in April to $3.39 a pound. That’s still well below the record of $4.21 a pound in Sept. 2014, DLR found.
The largest monthly leap came in the retail price of whole fresh chicken, which surged 12.2% to $1.57 a pound in April, according to the report. That’s the third highest monthly price for poultry, behind the $1.59 a pound recorded in June 2019 and the $1.57 a pound tallied in Aug. 2014. Before April’s jump, the product averaged $1.39 a pound for the first quarter of the year, less than the $1.47 a pound for the first three months of 2019.
The DLR analysts attributed the spike in retail prices to reduced supplies, which came as consumers concerned about COVID-19 ramped up their grocery purchases.
Temporary shortages in the meat case have prompted major grocery chains including Costco, Kroger and H-E-B to limit how much meat consumers can purchase.