SOUTH African manufacturers and retailers of food and other essential products warned that consumers will face much higher prices unless the government urgently finds solutions to the power cuts that are crippling the economy. Food, consumer goods companies and retailers in South Africa are cranking up diesel generators and spending more on backup power supplies, adding to the pressure from soaring costs for raw materials, transportation and packaging. South African businesses and households are spending between six and ten hours a day without electricity as state-owned utility Eskom implements some of the harshest blackouts in living memory owing to breakdowns…