In just four years, the price of tortillas – a staple food in the diet of nine out of 10 Mexicans – has skyrocketed almost 50 percent, official data reveal.
Due to the above, the government headed by President Claudia Sheinbaum entrusted the corresponding authorities with designing a strategy not only to stabilize its price, but also to reduce it during the rest of the six-year term.
According to the National Information and Market Integration System (SNIIM), in December 2020 the average price per kilogram of tortilla in Mexico was 15.54 pesos, while now it is approximately 23.17 pesos, a variation of 7.63 pesos or 49.1 percent.
According to estimates from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), the tortilla is the dietary supplement of more than 90 percent of Mexican families, making Mexico the main consumer of tortillas in the world. Likewise, the institution estimates that each Mexican eats around 75 kilos of tortilla per year.
A study by the Obesity Data Laboratory highlights that 84.9 percent of family units consume corn tortillas every day; 10.4 percent every other day, 3.6 percent once a week and 1 percent do it occasionally.
According to specialists, the sharp increase in the price of tortillas in the last four years is mainly due to the increase in the cost of inputs, especially corn, electricity and gas; unfair competition, increases in transportation and machinery costs; effects of the drought on national corn production and the trade dispute with the United States over transgenic corn.
In Mexico there are around 130 thousand tortilla shops. However, the corn flour industry, controlled by a small group of companies, is the one that has the greatest impact on the price consumers buy tortillas. According to estimates from different bodies, Maseca controls more than 70 percent of this business in Mexico, followed by Minsa, with around 25 percent. The rest is shared by Harimasa, Cargill de México and Molinos Anáhuac, among others.
In 2022, the federal government, then headed by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, held Maseca – a subsidiary of Gruma – directly responsible for the increase in the price of tortillas (which at that time had increased more than 30 percent in two years), for being a dominant player in this market.
Ricardo Sheffield, who at that time was the head of the Federal Consumer Prosecutor’s Office, highlighted that, regardless of how the prices of a ton of corn behave, this company kept its prices rising, which pushed most of the tortilla factories to the margins. to make the product more expensive.
One of Claudia Sheinbaum’s first actions as president was to entrust Julio Berdegué Sacristán, head of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, not only to stabilize the price of tortillas in Mexico, but to reduce it by at least 10 percent by the end of the six-year term. for which the government works with flour, corn and tortilla producers.