Year-on-year inflation soared to its highest within the last 12 months in February, the Department of Census and Statistics data shows.
According to the National Consumer Price Index (NCPI), the year-on-year inflation rate in February was 8.2%. The inflation rate in January was 6.5% and it had increased by approximately 0.5% during the month of February. Statistics reflect that the average price levels in February 2017 are 8.2% more than the average price level recorded in February 2016.
The trend shows that the year-on-year inflation has been rising from November 2016. In November 2016, inflation rate was 4.1%, and it had increased to 4.2% in December and increased further to 6.5% in January.
"NCPI has been calculated as 119.9 for February 2017. The monthly change in February was due to the increases of expenditure value of food items by 0.31% and non-food items by 0.23%. The increase in expenditure value of food commodity group in February 2017 compared to that of January 2017 was due to the price increases in coconuts, vegetables, coconut oil, fresh fish, green chillies, banana, mangoes, garlic and red onions. However, decreases in the expenditure value, in index, were reported for rice, lime, potato, mysore dhal, chicken, dried chilli and chilli powder," the Department of Census and Statistics stated.
Interestingly, expenditure value decreases were observed for groups of 'alcoholic beverages, tobacco and narcotics' and 'recreation and culture'.
