Lettuce among the five food with biggest price increases in past year

TORONTO – Increasingly expensive fruit and vegetable prices once again helped drive Canada’s annual inflation rate to 2.0 per cent in January. Food prices were up four per cent overall, while fruits rose 12.9 per cent and vegetable prices soared 18.2 per cent.

The five foods that rose the most between January 2015 and January 2016 were:

Lettuce: Salad isn’t cheap with a primary component, lettuce, costing 17.9 per cent more.

Tomatoes: Another salad staple ingredient, tomatoes jumped 11.9 per cent.

Apples: It could be getting harder for some consumers to have one of these each day, as the fruit rose 16.6 per cent. The average retail price last month for a kilogram of apples was $4.22.

Oranges: The citrus fruit rose 11 per cent in price. Last month, a kilogram of oranges cost, on average, $3.51.

Nuts: This broad category increased by 7.4 per cent.