Turkey panic buying grips UK as shoppers fear Xmas shortages - over 400% increase in sales

Despite the Health Secretary Sajid Javid's promise Christmas won't be cancelled, anxious shoppers have begun panic buying turkeys. Sales of frozen turkeys have increased by more than 400 percent in comparison to last year, Supermarket chain Iceland has said.

In September 2021, Iceland revealed the sales of the frozen Christmas staple went up 409 percent compared to the same month the year before, leading the customers to become “concerned about food supply”.

Richard Harrow, Chief Executive of the British Frozen Food Federation, has stated that during the pandemic some customers have “permanently converted” to buying frozen foods.

Continuing, he said that frozen food has grown “rapidly” during the Covid pandemic.

“This combined with current concerns about food supply means many people will be opting for frozen this Christmas,” he said.

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Oliver Dowden, Conservative Party Chairman, has vowed to ensure people will be able to purchase turkeys for their Christmas dinners as the issues with turkey production are being addressed.

“We will make sure that people have their turkeys for Christmas,” he told Sky News' Trevor Phillips on Sunday.

“I know that, the Environment Secretary George Eustice, this is absolutely top of his list.

“We are not unique in the UK in this.

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“If you look across Poland, the US, other countries, there are shortages of drivers – that's to do with a range of factors.”

Meanwhile, this follows the Prime Minister's failure to rule out food shortages lasting until Christmas.

Mr Johnson said Britain was going through a “period of adjustment” to get higher wages for British workers, he said during the first day of the Tory party conference in Manchester on Sunday.

“We are going to see a period in which the global economy, particularly the UK economy because of the speed of recovery, is sucking in demand very fast,” the Prime Minister said when asked whether food shortages could be expected over Christmas.

However, Liz Truss, the Foreign Secretary, has stated that the empty shelves cannot be blamed on the Government.

She denied the Government could be held “responsible for what's in the shops”, according to the Telegraph.

“I don't believe in a command and control economy, so I don't believe the Prime Minister is responsible for what's in the shops,” she said.

“This is why we have a free enterprise economy, I'm sure that the goods will be delivered into our shops.”