Weekly SPI increases by 0.38%

December 20, 2024 (MLN): Pakistan's short-term inflation increased by 0.38% compared to the previous week as of December 19, 2024, while it rose by 4.64% over the same period last year, the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) reported on Friday.

During the week, out of 51 items, prices of 15 (29.41%) items increased, 13 (25.49%) items decreased and 23 (45.10%) items remained stable.

Prices of key items rose, including Tomatoes (56.66%), Firewood (1.57%), Garlic (1.40%), Vegetable Ghee 2.5 Kg (0.95%), Cooking Oil 5 Litre (0.79%), Mustard Oil (0.74%), LPG (0.71%), Gur (0.28%), Vegetable Ghee 1 Kg (0.25%), Sugar (0.23%), Georgette (0.13%) and Long Cloth (0.10%).

On the other hand, the major decrease is observed in the prices Onions (4.16%), Potatoes (3.83%), Eggs (2.72%), Diesel (1.17%), Pulse Gram (0.98%), Wheat Flour (0.76%), Bananas (0.56%), Rice Basmati Broken & Pulse Moong (0.27%) each.

The year on year trend depicts increase of 4.64%, Tomatoes (95.54%), Ladies Sandal (75.09%), Pulse Gram (56.75%), Potatoes (50.81%), Pulse Moong (34.88%), Powdered Milk (25.62%), Beef (23.84%), Garlic (17.13%), Gas Charges for Q1 ( 15.52%), Cooked Daal (15.08%), Shirting (14.36%) and Firewood (12.43%).

Conversely, significant decreases were seen in the prices of Wheat Flour (36.15%), Chilies Powder (20.00%), Onions (13.74%), Eggs (12.98%), Pulse Masoor (10.64%), Rice Basmati Broken (7.62%), Diesel (7.49%), Electricity Charges for Q1 (6.96%), Bread (6.01%), Petrol (5.64%) and Sugar (5.20%). 

The lowest income group experienced a weekly increase of 0.68%, while the inflation for the highest income group inched up by 0.30%.

On a yearly basis, analysis of SPI change across different income segments showed that SPI increased across all quantiles ranging between 4.53% and 4.83%.

Yearly SPI for the Lowest Income Group increased by 4.79% while the highest income group recorded an increase of 4.61%.

The average price of Sona urea stood at Rs4,558 per 50 kg bag, up 0.36% from last week’s price, and 1.44% higher when compared to last year.

Meanwhile, the average Cement price fell to Rs1,412 per 50 kg bag, which is -0.24% lower than the previous week, while 14.31% higher than prices last year.

PBS calculates short-term inflation using the 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.

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