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THERE HAVE BEEN several suggestions this week that it could be time to start stockpiling Nutella.

Reports in the London Independent, the Financial Times and Quartz have suggested that prices of the delicious chocolatey-hazelnutty spread could be about to start climbing rapidly.

This speculation is due to a huge spike in the price of hazelnuts on the global market, which have shot up more than 60 per cent.

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Hazelnuts are a significant part of Nutella, which was originally developed in response to a chocolate shortage during the Second World War. And Nutella’s parent company Ferrero is the world’s largest hazelnut buyer – accounting for something like 25 per cent of the global supply, say Quartz.

And Turkey, where around 70 per cent of the world’s hazelnuts are grown, saw crops severely damaged by bad weather earlier this year – meaning there is now a shortage of Nutella ingredients, the Guardian reports.

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So does this mean you should run out on your lunch break and fill a trolley with family-size jars?

Well, is there EVER a bad time to do that? But anyway: not necessarily. Bloomberg Businessweek notes that in July Nutella’s parent company Ferrero bought Oltan Group – a large Turkish company that is the world’s “leading operator in the procurement, processing and marketing” of hazelnuts, according to the company press release.

So Ferrero – and thus Nutella – are likely to be in a better position than most to insulate themselves from the hazelnut price spike. But like we say: do you need a reason to stockpile Nutella? Probably not.

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