Weekly inflation drops 0.62%

August 23, 2024 (MLN): Pakistan's short-term inflation decreased for the third straight week, going down by 0.62% WoW during the week ended August 29, 2024, while the annual increase was 15.34%, the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) reported on Friday.

PBS calculates short-term inflation using the sensitive price indicator (SPI) on a weekly basis to assess the price movement of essential commodities at shorter interval of time so as to review the price situation in the country.

SPI comprises 51 essential items collected from 50 markets in 17 cities of the country. During the week, out of 51 items, prices of 17 (33.33%) items increased, 10 (19.61%) items decreased and 24 (47.06%) items remained stable

Major decrease was observed in the prices of Chicken (3.02%), Bananas (2.35%), Chilies Powder (1.42%), Wheat Flour (0.85%), and Pulse Masoor (0.68%)

On the other hand, an increase was observed in the prices of Tomatoes (8.03%), Onions (6.53%), Pulse Gram (2.20%), Garlic (1.76%) and Potatoes (0.63%)

The weekly SPI percentage change by income groups showed that SPI across all quantiles ranged from -0.86% and 0.11%.

The lowest income group experienced a weekly rise of 0.16%, while the highest income group experienced a fall of 0.58%.

On a yearly basis, analysis of SPI change across different income segments showed that SPI increased across all quantiles ranging between 9.78% and 17.92%.

Yearly SPI for the Lowest Income Group increased by 9.78% while the highest income group recorded an increase of 14.48%.

The average price of Sona urea stood at Rs4,692 per 50 kg bag which is 0.87% lower than last week’s price, while 23.33% higher when compared to last year.

Meanwhile, the average Cement price rose to Rs1,479 per 50 kg bag, which is 0.55% higher than the previous week and 25.7% higher than prices last year.

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