Singapore Imports Food Items – How It Deals with Rising Food Inflation

29 June 2022

Key Points

       ·         Singapore is known for its local cuisines, but it faces a challenge – food security.

       ·         As a small island nation, Singapore imports more than 90% of its food items.

       ·         Food prices in Singapore rose by 4.1% in April 2022, a year earlier.

Singapore is known for its variety of street food and local cuisines, however, the country faces a persistent challenge – food security. The issue was thrust into the national spotlight after recent food export bans, in particular, the chicken export ban by neighbouring Malaysia, from which Singapore imports about 30% of its chickens. Rising global food prices due to the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war is also a major concern for Singapore as the country imports more than 90% of its food items from more than 170 countries and regions. Food prices in Singapore increased by 4.1% in April 2022 from a year earlier and up from 3.3% recorded in March 2022.

Global Food Crisis and Impact on Singapore Food Industry

Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the prices of food items in the global market have risen, resulting in a fear of global food shortage. Over the past six months, prices of products such as cooking oil, eggs, and meat in Singapore have gone up between 30% and 45%. According to the Monetary Authority of Singapore, elevated global food prices are expected to keep contributing to local food inflation in 2022.

Global food prices had already started to rise during the Covid-19 pandemic, but the Russia-Ukraine war has worsened those inflationary pressures. Food shortage is expected to continue this year and may slit into next year as well. Other countries cannot quickly jump in to fill in the gap left by Russia and Ukraine because it takes at least one year to grow fresh produce.

While Singapore is still doing well to maintain food security, it is importing more food items from other countries to meet the domestic demand for commodities. Singapore has launched a “30 by 30” initiative to produce 30% of its nutritional needs by 2030.

Singapore Imports Processed Food and Agro-based Products from the World by Quarter

Singapore majorly imports animal or vegetable fats & oils, fats of bovine animals, sheep & goats, and food preparations. Here’s a list of Singapore’s top 10 food and agro-based products that were imported from the world in quarters of 2021 and Q1 of 2022.

*****Value US$ Million

Russia-Ukraine war will worsen the global food supply

Russia and Ukraine are the world’s top exporter countries of wheat, corn, and barley. In 2021, Russia supplied US$7,301 million worth of wheat, while US$5,854 million worth of wheat was exported from Ukraine. Now supplies from both the countries have been hit due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Below given chart shows the dollar amount of Russia and Ukraine exports of wheat, corn, and barley reported last year.

What can Singapore Do?

In the short term, Singapore can provide safety nets through cash payments or vouchers. However, one of Singapore’s weaknesses is that even though it tries to diversify its imports from a basket of countries, it’s still relying heavily on just one or two countries. For example, Singapore imported more than 40% of its chickens from Brazil and over 30% from Malaysia in 2021. Most of the chickens imported from Malaysia are live chickens, while the rest of the chickens imported from Brazil and other countries are frozen.

What exactly Singapore can do is that the government should encourage more Singapore companies to grow food overseas and form agreements with other governments to ensure produce isn’t subjected to export bans. Singapore is a technologically advanced country, it could look into helping other countries improve their food production systems. That will not only help Singapore to stabilize its food price and food security but also global food security and prices as well.