Mexico City.– Rising food prices and water shortages are hitting the profitability of restaurants, especially small and medium-sized establishments and those that do not belong to chains.
Daniela Mijares, executive president of the National Chamber of the Restaurant and Seasoned Food Industry (Canirac), said that the rise in food prices and the persistence of water shortages in several states are causing increases of more than 10 percent in restaurant operating costs.
“Coriander, avocado, tomato, and corn have become more expensive due to the drought we have been experiencing and the general water crisis in the country. This has made inputs that are essential for us much more expensive,” he said in an interview.
He added that the water shortages that various cities in the country continue to face were not included in the budgets of restaurants, so the water trucks to supply them are representing an additional cost.
“There are restaurants that are paying more than 6 thousand pesos per truck. Depending on the size of the restaurant, there will be one that survives with one truck every three days and there are others that are buying one every day,” he said.
He stressed that another of the industry’s major challenges is the professionalization of its employees, which is being disrupted by the increasing staff turnover, especially after the major changes brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic.
“This is not exclusive to the restaurant industry, but to many industries, and it is not exclusive to Mexico either. Mobility has been redefined around the world, and the way of seeing corporate jobs in service institutions and the tourism sector has also been redeemed, and that is costing us time, as it is clearly posing a significant challenge for the industry,” he commented.
Mijares considered that the restaurant sector in Acapulco is undoubtedly the most affected in the country, given that the establishments have not been able to recover, not only due to a lack of private resources to get the restaurants up and running, but also because the flow of visitors that existed before the passage of Hurricane ‘Otis’ has not yet been generated.
“We see the biggest problem in the Acapulco Diamante area because, in the end, all of those people who came because they had a second home, who vacationed in Acapulco on the weekend, all of those who went to these large apartment buildings will take a long time to rehabilitate. We know that restaurants, for example, in La Isla, are still closed right now,” he lamented.
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