Bakers are warning the price of a sliced pan and even the Waterford Blaa could rise this year because of ingredient shortages.
It follows a bad harvest in Britain -- and the imposition of trade tariffs on Canadian wheat for British mills.
Just two-fifths of the flour used here is actually produced in Ireland -- and the Irish Bakery Association says the flour stockpiles built up here for Brexit are now starting to run low.
Dermot Walsh is the Managing Director of Walsh's Bakehouse in Waterford. He told WLR News that, "It's inevitable that the cost of all bread, from the famous blaa in the morning to the sliced pan will more than likely be going up at some stage this year."
Ireland also lacks production of yeast or sugar and produces very little vegetable oil for bakery use. The industry is seeing price hikes on all these ingredients. As the cost of inputs goes up, the cost of bakery production must follow to maintain the industry's viability.
Dermot Walsh says it's a challenging time with Covid-19 and Brexit but he is hopeful about the future.
"We're operating at one-third of our business and that is our local business which we're very glad to have and it's great that we can still get such an amount of business locally.
"The other two-thirds are based in hospitality, schools and food service in general so, it's worrying times, but we have a very positive outlook for later on in the year.
"We're quite confident that as businesses start reopening we will feel its effect almost immediately."
