India’s Burger King stops selling tomatoes due to rising prices
Multiple Burger Kings across India removed tomatoes from the menu this week, after prices of the fruit quadrupled. “Even tomatoes need a vacation,” read notices posted outside two Burger King India outlets. McDonald’s and Subway have also dropped tomatoes from their menus, as India’s food inflation this week hit its highest level since January 2020. The cost of tomatoes soared after monsoon rains destroyed crops earlier this year; a kilogram of tomatoes sold in New Delhi currently costs 107 rupees ($1.29), up from $0.33 in January, according to data from the Department of Consumer Affairs. Jocelyn Boiteau, a postdoctoral associate at the Tata-Cornell Institute for Agriculture and Nutrition, told CNN that only a few regions in southern India have the right conditions for growing tomatoes during the summer, so any extreme weather in those areas has a national impact on tomato prices. India has now started importing tomatoes from Nepal, as rising food costs worry Narendra Modi’s government ahead of national elections next year.
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