The World Bank expects food commodity prices to rise 10% in 2026 and 7% in 2027, a cumulative 18%, it said on 28 October.
Its Commodity Markets Outlook has all commodity prices up 23% this year and down 7% in 2027. Energy rises 32% in 2026 after three years of declines, and metals rise 25%, with aluminium, copper and tin at record highs.
What is driving food prices
Grain shipments are disrupted by conflict, El Niño threatens harvests, and dear fuel and fertiliser lift farming costs, the bank said. Its forecast table has US hard red winter wheat averaging US$311 a tonne in 2026, 28% above 2025, and US$353 in 2027. Maize is forecast at US$223 a tonne this year, up 9.9%, and US$235 in 2027. Fertiliser is forecast 14% dearer in 2026, after urea jumped early in the year.
Ayhan Kose, the bank’s Deputy Chief Economist and Director of the Prospects Group, said: “Commodity markets are being hit by several major shocks at once.”
The oil forecast
Brent is forecast to average US$91 a barrel in 2026, up from US$69 in 2025, and to ease to US$79 in 2027. The bank expects oil output to drop 5.2% in 2026, the steepest fall in over 40 years apart from 2020, with demand down 2.5%. Production stays below consumption, so stocks keep falling and markets are more exposed to a new shock.
Source: World Bank, Commodity Markets Outlook, October 2026 price forecasts. 2026 to 2027 are forecasts. Wheat is US hard red winter. Chart: Rand Desk
The risk case
The baseline assumes the conflicts do not widen. A wider Middle East conflict, strikes on grain ships in the Black Sea and an especially intense El Niño could combine into a food crisis, according to the bank. In that case Brent would average US$105 in 2027 and food prices would be 12% above the baseline, higher than in 2022.
What it means for South African prices
Stats SA reported on 21 October that food and non-alcoholic beverages rose 1.2% over the year to September, with food alone up 1.0%. Cereal products were 1.9% cheaper than a year ago. The headline rate was 4.5%, as we reported on the September figures.
The fuel levy cut from 4 November takes some pressure off pump prices, and the early data on the November petrol price shows the direction of the next change.
The World Bank’s next Commodity Markets Outlook is due in April 2027, and Stats SA publishes October’s consumer inflation on 18 November.
