Weekly inflation declines by 0.62% amid mixed price trends

The weekly inflation, measured by the Sensitive Price Indicator (SPI), recorded a further decrease of 0.62% for the combined consumption groups during the week ending on August 29, according to the latest data released by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) on Friday.

The SPI for the week under review was recorded at 319.73 points, down from 321.72 points the previous week. Compared to the corresponding week last year, the SPI for the combined consumption group saw an increase of 15.34%.

The SPI, which uses the base year 2015-16 = 100, covers 17 urban centres and tracks 51 essential items across all expenditure groups.

For the lowest consumption group (up to Rs 17,732), the SPI saw a slight increase of 0.24%, rising to 310.80 points from last week’s 310.29 points. 

Conversely, the SPI for the consumption group ranging from Rs 17,732 to Rs 22,888 also recorded a small increase of 0.11%. 

However, the SPI for the consumption groups of Rs 22,889-29,517, Rs 29,518-44,175, and above Rs 44,175, decreased by 0.64%, 0.86%, and 0.58%, respectively.

During the week, out of the 51 items monitored, prices of 17 items (33.33%) increased, 10 items (19.61%) decreased, and 24 items (47.06%) remained stable.

Major price decreases on a week-on-week basis included chicken (3.02%), bananas (2.35%), chilli powder (1.42%), wheat flour (0.85%), pulse masoor (0.68%), bread (0.56%), pulse mash (0.53%), and sugar (0.49%).

On the other hand, the commodities that saw significant price increases included tomatoes (8.03%), onions (6.53%), pulse gram (2.20%), garlic (1.76%), potatoes (0.63%), eggs (0.55%), LPG (0.51%), gur and rice basmati broken (0.41% each), firewood (0.12%), and shirting (0.07%).

On a year-on-year basis, notable price decreases were observed in wheat flour (36.73%), chilli powder (18.94%), electricity charges for Q1 (16.91%), sugar (16.08%), cooking oil 5 litre (11.32%), petrol (10.07%), diesel (9.22%), rice basmati broken (8.81%), vegetable ghee 2.5 kg (7.24%), vegetable ghee 1 kg (6.20%), gur (4.63%), and washing soap (0.35%).

Conversely, significant price increases on a year-on-year basis included gas charges for Q1 (570.00%), onions (95.16%), pulse gram (53.59%), tomatoes (43.21%), powdered milk (26.14%), garlic (25.74%), beef (23.93%), pulse moong (23.72%), shirting (23.70%), salt powder (21.45%), georgette (15.18%), and energy savers (12.87%).