The average cost of home-cooked chicken thali, unlike how most perceive, continued to remain lesser than the vegetarian thali in the month of July. If you prefer chicken over daal and veggies, you have continued to pay less in the previous month owing to stable broiler prices, and surge in prices of tomato, onion and potato, said Crisil’s monthly indicator of food plate cost – The Roti Rice Rate.
The average cost of preparing a thali at home is calculated based on input prices prevailing in north, south, east and west India. The monthly change reflects the impact on the common man’s expenditure. The data also reveals the ingredients (cereals, pulses, broilers, vegetables, spices, edible oil and cooking gas) driving the change in the cost of the thali.
According to the CRISIL MI&A Research estimates, the cost of home-cooked non-veg thali decreased by 9 per cent in July, while that of veg thali declined by 4 per cent on-year during the same month. The cost of non-veg thali fell due to an estimated 11 per cent on-year decline in broiler prices on the high base of fiscal 2024. Broiler poultry accounts for 50 per cent of the non-vegetarian thali cost.
Meanwhile, the price of home-cooked veg thali declined by 4 per cent due to a 40 per cent drop in tomato prices on the high base of the previous fiscal. Prices of tomato had touched Rs 110 per kg in July 2023, affected by flash floods that hit supply from northern states while pest infestation impacted the output from Karnataka. A 65 per cent and 55 per cent increase in prices of onion and potato, according to Crisil, arrested a further decline in the cost of veg thali amid lower arrivals.
Now, on a month-on-month basis, the cost of both non-veg and veg thalis went up by 6 per cent and 11 per cent respectively. Out of the total 11 per cent rise in the price of veg thali, 7 per cent increase can be attributed to only tomato prices, which have zoomed 55 per cent on-month from around Rs 42 per kg in June to approximately Rs 66 per kg in July. This, Crisil added, was mainly due to high temperatures impacting the summer crop in key states of Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh; additionally, scattered rainfall in May in Karnataka escalated whitefly infestations, thereby impacting the crop output. Price of onion and potato too rose by 20 per cent and 16 per cent on-month, respectively, further contributing to the higher cost of the veg thali. While lower rabi production impacted onion prices, late blight infestation in Punjab, Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh affected the potato output, stated the Crisil report.
The cost of non-veg thali, however, rose at a slower pace compared to the veg thali since the price of broiler is estimated to have remained stable.
During the previous month, that is June, the cost of non-veg thali had declined by 4 per cent, while that of veg thali had become dearer by 10 per cent on-year.