Combined income groups: weekly SPI inflation edges down by 0.03 percent

The Sensitive Price Index (SPI) based inflation for combined income groups during the week ended December 19, 2019 witnessed a slight reduction of 0.03 percent against December 12, 2019 as it came down from 130.06 points to 130.02 points, said the data released by Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) on Monday.

According to the PBS, the weekly inflation related data based on 2015-16 mechanism covering 17 urban and 51 essential items for all expenditure groups disclosed that SPI on annual basis reached 17.94 percent from 110.24 points on December 20, 2018 to 130.02 points on December 19, 2019.

According to the data, SPI for income group with monthly income of Rs 17,732 registered a decline of 0.24 percent on weekly basis from 133.99 points to 133.67 points, while on annual basis it went up by 17.86 percent from 113.41 points to 133.67 points. For the income group of Rs 17,732-22,888 weekly SPI declined by 0.20 percent from 129.75 points to 129.49 points and on annual basis it witnessed an increase of 18.46 percent from 109.31 points to 129.49 points.

For the monthly income group of Rs 22,889-29,517 weekly inflation went down by 0.12 percent from 131.21 points to 131.05 points and on annual basis it went up by 20.79 percent from 108.49 points to 131.05 points. Weekly inflation for the income group with monthly income of Rs 29,518-44,175 went down by 0.07 percent from 128.13 points to 128.04 points and on annual basis SPI for the above income group jumped up by 19.69 percent from 106.98 points to 128.04 points.

For the income group of Rs 44,175 or above, weekly inflation went up by 0.07 percent from 131.65 points to 131.74 points and on annual basis SPI for the income group witnessed an increase of 17.26 percent from 112.35 points to 131.74 points.

During the week under review, prices of 27 commodities witnessed an increase: eggs, bananas, liquefied petroleum gas, potatoes, vegetable ghee, energy saver, chicken, gram pulse, cooking oil, pulse Mash, pulse Masoor, a plate of cooked pulse, wheat flour bag, firewood, refined sugar, gur, garlic, curd, fresh milk, mustard oil and shirting.

Average prices of 3 items during the week under review registered reduction which included tomatoes, onions and basmati rice.

According to PBS, during the period prices of 21 items remained unchanged, including, Irri-6 rice, powdered milk, long cloth, beef, mutton, Lipton Yellow Label tea, gents sandals, petrol, high speed diesel, match box, ladies sandals, telephone call charges, clothing, powdered salt and others.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2019