Food prices have started rising again in recent months after a period of cooling inflation, making holiday shopping difficult for families on a tight budget.

Grocery prices now are 2.7% higher than a year ago and remain more than 25% higher than five years ago, David L. Ortega, food economist and Noel W. Stuckman Chair in Food Economics and Policy at Michigan State University, said.

“It’s really low-income households that bear the brunt of those price increases,” he said. “And with the lapse in SNAP benefits over the week, that’s creating a lot of uncertainty for low-income households that compounds a lot of the inflationary impacts.”

The recent uptick in food inflation reflects a mix of factors, including labor and supply constraints in certain industries and higher prices for imports

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