Inflation in British grocery prices fell to 9.7 percent in the four weeks ending 29 October, the first time monthly food price gains have been limited to single digits since July 2022, research service Kantar reported.

The previous reading had been 11 percent.

“While the drop … is something of a watershed, consumers will still be feeling the pinch,” Fraser McKevitt, Kantar’s chief of retail and consumer insight, said in a statement. “We’re only seeing year on year price falls in a limited number of major categories including butter, dried pasta, and milk.”

Prices are still on the rise for eggs, candy, and frozen potato products.

Britain’s major supermarket chains have cut prices of some essential items in recent months to try to help keep food affordable. Sainsbury’s reported spending £118 million, equivalent to about $146 million, since March to keep prices from rising even higher.

Food inflation has been a key consideration in the Bank of England’s deliberations over whether to raise interest rates. Also, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has pledged to cut overall inflation in half before next year’s expected general election. 

TRENDPOST: In October, consumer spending in the U.K. grew at its slowest in more than a year as shoppers hold their money tight ahead of the holiday shopping season, a Barclays survey reported. Thus grocery prices rising 9.7 the claim that inflation is falling us a sick economic joke and the reality is that it is very costly to the British masses who will keep spending more to buy less.