An ‘excessive increase’ in local fruit and vegetable prices with 27 out of 30 products examined in a survey showing unreasonably high profit margins was reported by the consumers association on Tuesday.
According to the findings of the second major survey carried out by the association in 2025, the price increase mainly concerned retail prices, with retailers charging significantly more than what would be considered fair compared to how much they pay to producers.
“The data from the new survey led to the conclusion that there is still a serious problem in the marketing of fresh fruits and vegetables, which leads to an excessive increase in their retail prices.”, the consumers association said.
The greatest disparity was reported for bananas, with the retail price 110 per cent higher than the producer price, followed by red cabbage, 102 per cent, carrots, almost 90 per cent, red eggplants and onions, both around 80 per cent.
Overall, the survey, comparing the prices of supermarkets and local people’s markets in the period from April to July 2025 with the same period of the previous year, found an average increase of 17 per cent in producer prices and a smaller average increase of 9 per cent in retail prices.
Despite new survey data reporting a slight decrease of excessive increase in retail prices compared to the first survey in 2025, the association said that the development still remained a concern.
“The prices offered at the people’s markets in Nicosia are 28-38 per cent lower than the retail prices recorded in the e-basket,” the association said, referring to the ‘e-Kofini’ application, which regularly publishes the average selling prices of basic locally produced fruit and vegetable products.
Calling on the authorities to take “appropriate measures”, the association said that the problem affected consumers and producers alike, with the latter suffering from the unreasonably high profit margins if they were not paid accordingly.
The consumers association’s research has been summarized in 40 tables, which have been posted on the website of the Cyprus consumers association: www.katanalotis.org.cy