Fresh inflation reading augments prospects of further rise in interest rates scheduled to be announced on Tuesday
\n ISLAMABAD
\nAnnual inflation, measured by the Consumer Price Index (CPI), soared to a record high of 35.37 percent in March, compared to 31.55pc in the previous month, driven by massive increases in food and transport prices in Pakistan.
\nThe Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) spokesman said the number was the highest in nearly five decades, as the government scrambled to meet International Monetary Fund (IMF) conditions to unlock a desperately needed bailout.
\nMonth-on-month inflation was 3.72 percent, according to government data released Saturday, while the average inflation rate for the past year was 27.26 percent.
\n\u201cThis is the highest ever inflation recorded in the data we have,\u201d he added.
\nHigher prices of food, cooking oil, and electricity pushed up the index, the bureau said. The South Asian nation has been in economic turmoil for months with an acute balance of payments crisis, while talks with the IMF to secure bailout funding have stalled.
\n\u201cThe way inflation is rising, I believe a famine-like situation has been simmering,\u201d said Shahida Wizarat, a Karachi-based analyst.
\nIn March 2023, urban Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation rose to 33.0% year-on-year, compared to 28.8% in the previous month and 11.9% in March 2022. Month-on-month, it increased to 3.9%, compared to 4.5% in the previous month and 0.7% in March 2022.
\nRural CPI inflation also increased in March 2023 to 38.9% year-on-year, compared to 35.6% in the previous month and 13.9% in March 2022. On a month-on-month basis, rural CPI inflation rose to 3.5%, compared to 4.0% in the previous month and 1.0% in March 2022.
\nInflation is expected to stay at \u201celevated\u201d levels, the Finance Ministry said, \u201cowing to market frictions caused by relative demand and supply gap of essential items, exchange rate depreciation and recent upward adjustment of administered prices of petrol and diesel,\u201d
\nFor the week under review, SPI was recorded at 249.66 points against 250.66 points registered last week and 171.82 points recorded during the week ended March 31, 2022.
\nOut of 51 items in the SPI basket, prices of 23 items soared while those of 11 items decreased, however, rates of 17 items remained unchanged.
\nThe Wholesale Price Index (WPI), which monitors prices in the wholesale market, also rose sharply to 37.5% in March compared to 23.8% in the same month a year ago.
\nPBS data noted decrease in prices of onions (15.10 percent), chicken (11.96 percent), tomatoes (10.26 percent), LPG (1.35 percent), cooking oil 5 litre (1.24 percent), vegetable ghee 1kg (1.07 percent), vegetable ghee 2.5kg (0.77 percent), pulse gram (0.42 percent), firewood (0.35 percent), pulse moong (0.22 percent) and mustard oil (0.17 percent).
\nThe items whose prices increased the most over the same week a year ago were cigarettes (165.88pc), onions (127.07pc), wheat flour (123.22pc), gas charges for Q1 (108.38pc), diesel (102.84pc), tea Lipton (98.08pc), eggs (96.67pc), bananas (94.89pc), rice basmati broken (83.65pc), petrol (81.17pc), rice Irri-6\/9 (79.17pc), pulse moong (67.85pc) and potatoes (56.44pc).
\nThe inflation situation has worsened to its worst, steeping the masses, whose purchasing power has eroded by leaps and bounds, into misery, as the price of almost every edible item has gone through the roof over a period of months.
\nAnalysts believe Pakistan is now heading towards hyperinflation \u2014 a situation when prices are out of control and in the territory of a 50% surge.
\nThe federal and provincial governments are even unable to ensure steady essential food supplies.
\nThe prices are soaring at a time when the economy has slowed down significantly and poverty, as well as unemployment, are spiking.
\nThe prices of a majority of consumer goods remained out of the reach of the people, and a major surge was witnessed in rural areas where income levels were already low.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Fresh inflation reading augments prospects of further rise in interest rates scheduled to be announced on Tuesday ISLAMABAD Annual inflation, measured by the Consumer Price Index (CPI), soared to a record high of 35.37 percent in March, compared to 31.55pc in the previous month, driven by massive increases in food and transport prices in Pakistan. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":290811,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[210],"class_list":{"0":"post-323225","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-top-news","8":"tag-inflation"},"yoast_head":"\n