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Sweden has EU's second highest food prices

The Local Sweden
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Sweden has EU's second highest food prices
A shopper prepares for the inevitable fleecing. Photo: Fredrik Persson/TT

Sweden is the second most expensive country in the EU for food and non-alcoholic drinks, a new Eurostat survey shows.

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Only Denmark is pricier, with Sweden’s Nordic neighbours coughing up 146% of the EU average in 2015. 

Grocery shopping in Sweden costs 124% of the EU average. Austria rounds out the top three, with 120%, the study shows.

On the other end of the scale, relative bargains can be had in central and eastern Europe, with Poland (63%), Romania (64%) and Bulgaria (70%) the least expensive countries in the 28-nation bloc. 

Sweden prices well above the EU average in all sub-categories monitored. Some people might be surprised however to learn that Sweden (141%) isn’t in the top three for alcoholic drinks. Those spots are nabbed by Ireland (175%), Finland (172%) and the UK (163%). 

Sweden has the third-highest prices in the ‘bread and cereals’ and ‘meat’ categories. 

Price in Sweden came closest to the rest of EU in the ‘milk, eggs and cheese’ (116%) and ‘tobacco’ (118%) categories. 

The stats agency also scoured prices in ten countries outside the EU and found that Norway and Switzerland, in line with tradition, are more expensive than any countries inside the bloc. And real bargain hunters should look no further than Macedonia, where food prices come in at 59 percent of the EU average. 

The figures are based on the results of a price survey covering 440 products across Europe, carried out by the European group looking at purchasing power on the continent.

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