If you're spending a fortune on food you need to watch this video. News24 compares the prices of four food items at major national wholesale markets and branches of four major retailers.

Following a hike in fuel prices last week, the cost of freighting fresh fruit and vegetables around South Africa by road has increased.

Several traders told News24 they hoped to absorb the rising cost of road transport, which puts further.

Drought has already pushed up the price of fresh produce, with the quality and quantity of yields taking strain.

In light of the fuel hike and the rising cost of food, News24 visited four retailers to compare the price of four items.

We looked at potatoes, onions, tomatoes and apples to see how much different retailers charged. Importantly, we neither assessed the quality of the different products nor the shopping experience.

In order to understand the fresh food trade better, we also asked markets in Tshwane, Durban and Cape Town for their average price on these items last week.

Prices vary according to whether or not items are at all processed (such as peeled) or packaged, so our survey considered the loose version of items at supermarkets.

The only exception was the price for Granny Smith apples from Woolworths; the store we consulted said they only stocked the bagged variety. In that case we took the bagged price and divided it by weight to obtain a per kilogram figure, though an admittedly limited one at that.

We also took the average prices for each of the four items from the markets, not the highest or lowest prices for the product at that market on that day.

In short, these figures are variable, subject to change and correct only at the time of publication for the specific shops we surveyed (all in Cape Town).

Watch the video clip for the price comparison