Pakistan’s weekly inflation rises to 30.8%

F.P. Report

ISLAMABAD: The short-term inflation, measured by Sensitive Price Indicator (SPI), continues to rise with a year-on-year increase of 30.82 per cent for the week ending on Aug 10, Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) official data showed. On a week-on-week basis, the short-term inflation, rose 0.69pc, and shows no signs of slowing down, causing concern for economists and consumers alike.

Of the 51 items in the SPI basket, prices of 29 goods soared, five dropped and 17 remained unchanged compared to the previous week. During the week under review, the items whose prices increased the most over the same week a year ago were: wheat flour (131.81pc), cigarettes (109.57pc), gas charges for Q1 (108.38pc), tea Lipton (95.19pc), rice basmati broken (84.09pc), chillies powder (72.94pc), rice Irri-6/9 (72.74pc), sugar (67.90pc), chicken (65.87pc), gur (58.93pc), gents sponge chappal (58.05pc), potatoes (57.02pc) and tomatoes (53.66pc).

The biggest rise week-on-week was in the price of chillies powder (3.72pc), powdered milk (3.65pc), pulse mash (3.13pc), garlic (2.39pc), sugar (2.30pc), chicken (2.27pc), salt (1.84pc), and eggs (1.74pc). (INP)