USDA blames Russia for rising Thanksgiving dinner prices

The Department of Agriculture says Russia’s ongoing war in Ukraine is one reason your Thanksgiving dinner is costing more than last year.

A USDA memo this month said turkey prices will be higher because of this year’s outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI), which is expected to kill 8 million turkeys by 2022 . But the USDA also said “Russia’s war against Ukraine and the drought around the world. United States” are other factors that are “pushing up the price of Thanksgiving staples.”

The USDA did not respond to questions from Fox News Digital about how Russia’s war against Ukraine is affecting turkey prices. President Biden and his administration have often blamed Russia for the broad rise in inflation and referred to rising food and energy prices as “Putin’s price hike.”

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President Biden’s Department of Agriculture blames Russia for higher Thanksgiving commodity prices.
(Win McNamee/Getty Images)

Data from the Biden administration, however, shows that inflation began rising almost immediately after Biden took office in February 2021.

Just before Russia invaded Ukraine in late February 2022, the Biden administration reported that consumer prices rose 7.5% in the year ending January 2022, according to the Bureau of Statistics Labor Inflation is expected to rise to 9.1% in the year ending June 2022, but sharp increases were seen long before Russia invaded Ukraine.

Ukraine is a major grain exporter, and Russia’s effort to block those exports has caused prices to rise. But again, feed grain prices were rising along with the prices of many other commodities before the Russian invasion.

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Thanksgiving will be more expensive this year, but the Biden administration is playing down the cost increase.
(iStock)

The USDA note said the Biden administration has made progress in fighting higher grocery prices by noting that the 0.4 percent increase in grocery prices in October was the “smallest increase since December last year”.

That memo also downplayed the impact that inflation is having on the cost of Thanksgiving dinner compared to non-government estimates. He said the average cost of retail Thanksgiving staples like a fresh turkey, sweet potatoes, cranberries and green beans will cost only about 1 percent more this year compared to last year, and that replacing a turkey frozen means a 6% increase.

But the American Farm Bureau Federation says the average cost of a Thanksgiving dinner is up 20 percent compared to last year. The cost of stuffing mix, frozen pie crusts, whipping cream, frozen peas and dinner rolls have increased by more than 20 percent, the Farm Bureau said.

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The USDA, headed by Secretary Tom Vilsack, says Thanksgiving won’t be much more expensive this year, although non-government estimates expect prices to rise by 20 percent. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
(Getty)

While those prices may remain high during the holidays, the turkey prices you see in stores haven’t gone up that much. Beth Breeding, vice president of communications and marketing for the National Turkey Federation, said grocers typically lower turkey prices closer to Thanksgiving and use turkeys as loss leaders to attract clients.

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Still, he said prices seen in actual stores in the days leading up to Thanksgiving are higher than last year, going from about 93 cents a pound to $1 a pound, an increase of approximately 7%.

The breeder and the USDA said that despite this year’s bout of bird flu, there are still plenty of turkeys to buy for Thanksgiving. Breeding said about 40 million turkeys will be consumed during the Thanksgiving holiday.