Retailers are holding on to hope supply issues will ease by the end of the month.

Consumers are warned to expect empty supermarket shelves as COVID-induced staff shortages add to existing supply disruptions.

Coles has already imposed buying limits on some meat products.

Australian Retailers Association Chief Industry Affairs Officer Fleur Brown told Chris Smith there’s some light at the end of the tunnel.

“We had a whole lot of supply chain issues that have lingered; they were really intense through the Christmas period.

“We’re projecting that supply chain issues generally, globally, will last for another 12 months at least.

“[But] if Woolies, Aldi and others are not following suit, there’d be a pretty positive reason for that.”

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National Secretary of the Transport Workers Union, Michael Kaine, told Chris what’s important now is solving staff shortages in the supply chain.

“We’ve got diabolical numbers and those numbers will start to plateau, but that plateau will be very high, Chris.

“The question is: how do we get that back down in critical sectors like transport, which are responsible for getting not only our supermarket goods to the shelves, but for getting these tests to the rest of the community.”

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