The average UK household will fork out £78 for cheese in a 12-month period – and there are fears prices will go up further in future.

The conflict in Iran is expected to have a knock on effect on the price of various household goods, not just energy bills and fuel but on everyday grocery items sold in supermarkets.

The Institute of Grocery Distribution (IGD) has warned that the Middle East crisis could cause food inflation to more than double by summer, with fears food inflation could climb from its current 3.6% rate to as much as 8% by June should the war drag on.

Right now, estimates for a reported average cheese consumption for the UK suggest a typical cheese eating British person gets through 30g of cheese per day, which is 210g per week.

While cheese prices can vary from supermarket to supermarket, as of Friday, March 27, a 400g packet of British Mature Cheddar from Asda cost £3, which is £7.50 per kg. At Tesco, 400g of Mature Cheddar was £3.35 and at Aldi it was £2.49 on offer.

Taking the middle figure of £3 but rounding down to 200g per week consumption, it means UK households with typical cheese eating habits will pay an average of £78 per year per person for their cheddar (£1.50 per week). For a two-person household, that would mean £156 in cheese charges in one year.

Sadly, unlike energy bills there is no cheese price cap to control what happens to Cheddar prices going forwards, so it is possible that cheese prices at any given supermarket could increase by this time next year.

Speaking on The Martin Lewis Money Show Live last week, money expert Martin Lewis explained how food prices are affected by the rising prices of oil and gas resulting from the war in the Middle East.

Martin explained that the cost of oil indirectly affects “everything else” because it costs petrol to move food around, which is then reflected in the cost you pay at the till. He told his viewers: “Food prices and everything else, look, the first thing is the direct cost. Oil is the thing that’s gone up the most, petrol, diesel, heating oil, LPG, they have gone up and I’m talking about that in this part.

“But, of course, all those goods that are transported like food, all those goods that need refrigeration, like food, all of those, the underlying costs, the input factors to firms, are going up which means their prices will go up.

“But the most important thing to understand about this, while the rise is quite severe, the real question is the length more than the severity. If this were to end in a couple of weeks there would be a small impact, we’d notice it, but then hopefully things will get back to normal. If this is still going on in months’ or years’ time, then I think it will have a much more substantial hit. So the question is all about the length.”