Seoul Metropolitan Government's agricultural corporation surveys chuseok ritual table costs

Hypermarket costs up 6% from last year to 290,711 won; traditional markets up 3.5% to 245,051 won

[Yonhap]
[Yonhap]

Setting up a chuseok ritual table at a Seoul hypermarket will cost 290,711 won ($212) this year, up 6% from last year, according to a survey. Traditional market shoppers will pay 245,051 won, a 3.5% increase. Vegetables, which rose more than 10% on average, were the main driver of the overall cost increase.

Seoul Agricultural & Marine Products Corporation conducted the survey ahead of the chuseok holiday, visiting 25 retail outlets across Seoul — including 16 traditional markets, eight hypermarkets and Garakmal, the general food market inside Garak Market — and released the results Friday.

Traditional markets offered lower prices than hypermarkets for namul vegetables such as bracken and peeled bellflower root, seafood including frozen pollack fillet and yellow croaker, and meat products such as beef and chicken. Hypermarkets, however, were cheaper for some processed and packaged goods, including songpyeon rice cakes, dasik confections, imitation crab sticks and eggs.

Garakmal posted a total cost of 228,000 won, up 5.6% from a year earlier, but still the cheapest option among all retail formats surveyed — 7.0% below traditional markets and 21.6% below hypermarkets. Garakmal offered lower prices than the other formats for vegetables such as radish, green onion, zucchini, bracken and peeled bellflower root, as well as pork, chicken and some processed foods. Among fruits, apples and jujubes were cheaper there than at hypermarkets.

By category, vegetables led the overall price increase, rising 14.7% on average across the three retail formats. Meat products followed at 7.4%, seafood at 6.2% and fruits at 3.6%. Processed foods held roughly steady from a year earlier.

Vegetable prices climbed due to summer heat waves and frequent rainfall. Zucchini surged 43.8%, radish rose 24.9% and bellflower root gained 23.0%. Baby cabbage and green onion, however, fell 9.6% and 2.0%, respectively, as increased supply from stored inventory entered the market.

Among fruits, apples were nearly flat, slipping just 0.1% from last year. Dried persimmons fell 12.0% and jujubes dropped 14.5%. Pears and chestnuts rose 12.7% and 15.4%, respectively, driven by holiday demand.

In seafood, lower catch volumes and reduced inventory pushed frozen pollack fillet up 20.1% and dried pollock up 10.8%. Yellow croaker fell 6.4% after the government released stockpiles and ran discount promotions.

Meat prices rose as livestock numbers and slaughter volumes declined. Pork climbed 18.5% and beef for soup gained 10.5%. Beef for skewered dishes was nearly unchanged, up just 0.3%.

Among processed foods, songpyeon fell 5.9%, imitation crab sticks dropped 8.3% and sikhye rice punch declined 3.7%. Pancake mix and cheongju rice wine each rose 5.8%.

The survey prices are based on Sept. 9, two weeks before the chuseok holiday, and may differ from prices at the time of actual shopping.

The corporation surveys and publishes the cost of purchasing 34 key seasonal items for a six-person family's ritual table. The latest survey was conducted Sept. 9 by a team of 10 — including members of Seoul's consumer price monitoring unit and senior employment price surveyors — who visited 16 traditional markets, eight hypermarkets and Garakmal across eight autonomous districts.

A separate survey by the Korea Price Research Center yielded similar findings. The center surveyed prices for 28 ritual table items at traditional markets in six cities — Seoul, Busan, Incheon, Daegu, Gwangju and Daejeon — on Sept. 10 and Sept. 11, and found the total cost for a four-person family came to 303,750 won, up 4.1% from 291,810 won last year. Zucchini showed the sharpest price increase in that survey as well, with a single zucchini priced at 2,410 won — up 92.8% from a year ago — as reduced sunlight following heavy rains late last month hurt harvests. Five pears cost 27,300 won, up 16.0%. Radish rose 24.0% to 2,530 won, and a pack of 10 eggs climbed 8.9% to 2,820 won.


cook@heraldcorp.com