ISLAMABAD: The Sensitive Price Indicator (SPI) based inflation snapped a four-week winning streak and decreased by 0.14 percent for the week ended on January 25, 2024, after rising by 0.34 percent, 1.36 percent, 0.37 percent and 0.81 in the preceding four weeks. According to the data released by Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) on Friday, inflation on a year-on-year basis increased by 43.79 percent during the week as compared to the corresponding period of the last year. The inflation for the week ended on January 25 for the lowest income group (Q1) witnessed a decrease of 0.33 percent, while it went up by 36.23 percent on a year-on-year (YoY) basis for the same income group. For the other four income groups, the weekly inflation decreased from 0.08 percent (Q5) to 0.29 percent (Q2), while it went up from 41.40 percent (Q2) to 47.49 percent (Q3) on a year-on-year (YoY) basis. According to the PBS, the combined index was at 318.55 on January 25, 2024 as compared to 319 on January 18, 2024, while the index was recorded at 221.54 a year ago on January 26, 2023. TLTP
The SPI is computed on a weekly basis to assess the price movements of essential commodities at a shorter interval of time so as to review the price situation in the country. The SPI with base 2015-16=100 comprises 51 essential items and the prices are being collected from 50 markets in 17 cities of the country for all expenditure groups/quintiles and combined.
During the week under review, out of 51 items, prices of 15 (29.41%) items increased, prices of 13 (25.49%) items decreased, and prices of 23 (45.10%) items remained stable.
The SPI for the current week recorded a decrease in the prices of items including tomatoes (14.14%), potatoes (5.06%), onions (1.64%), tea Lipton (1.19%), bananas (0.81%), pulse gram (0.33%), garlic (0.26%) and mustard oil (0.17%).
On the other hand, a major increase was observed in the prices of items including chicken (3.31%), cooked daal (1.32%), gur (0.98%), tea prepared (0.92%), pulse Moong (0.80%), energy saver (0.54%), pulse Mash and eggs (0.43% each), LPG (0.28%), beef (0.25%), wheat flour (0.16%) and firewood (0.03%).
According to the PBS data, the year-on-year trend depicts an increase of 43.79 percent, including gas charges for Q1 (1108.59%), tomatoes (133.36%), cigarettes (93.22%), chilies’ powder (81.74%), wheat flour (62.36%), sugar (58.52%), gents sponge chappal (58.05%), garlic (54.66%), gents sandal (53.37%), gur (52.29%), eggs (46.80%) and rice IRRI-6/9 (43.48%).
On a year-on-year basis, a major decrease was observed in the prices of onions (8.64%), mustard oil (7.51%), bananas (6.52%) and vegetable ghee 1-kg (1.33%).
