Accra, May 13, GNA – The year-on-year inflation rate for April rose sharply to 10. 6 percent as the effect of the three-week lockdown following the coronavirus confirmed cases bites.
The rate increased by 2.8 percentage points from the 7.8 percent recorded in March, Professor Samuel Annim, Government Statistician, said on Wednesday.
The month-on-month inflation between March 2020 and April 2020 was 3.2 percent.
“The average national inflation stood at 10.6 percent. Food inflation (14.4 percent) outpaced Non-food inflation (7.7 percent), especially in the two regions with areas which were under partial COVID-19 lockdown, Greater Accra 20.8 per cent and Ashanti.18.2 per cent,” he said.
The Food and Non-alcoholic Beverages Division recorded a year-on-year inflation rate of 14.4 percent, six percentage point higher than March 2020 at 8.4 percent and 6.5 percentage points higher than the average Food inflation rate recorded in the previous eight months of 7.9 percent.
“This translates to Food being the predominant driver of year-on-year inflation. Food contributed 59.6 percent of the year-on-year inflation in April 2020,” Prof Annim said.
In the previous eight months the contribution was on average 44.1 percent.
Month-on-month Food inflation stood at 6.4 percent, meaning that between March 2020 and April 2020 the average price level of Food and Non-alcoholic beverages increased by 6.4 percent.
Within the Food Division, Vegetables (+37%) and Fruits&Nuts (+20.5%) were the Subclasses with the highest rates of inflation for both year-on-year and month-on-month inflation.
Within the Housing, Water, Electricity, and Gas Division (+11.2%), the Subclasses ‘Solid Fuels (16.7%)’ and ‘Materials for the Maintenance and Repair of Dwelling (13.1%)’ recorded the highest inflation rates.
At the regional level, the overall year-on-year inflation ranged from 2.3 percent in the Upper East Region to 15.1 percent in Greater Accra.
Inflation of imported goods was 4.9 percent, while the inflation of local goods was 13.1 percent on average, the highest rate of local inflation and the lowest rate of imported goods inflation since the rebasing in August 2019.
Month-on-month inflation for imported goods was 0 percent, while month-on-month inflation for local goods was 4.5 percent. The main contributor to local inflation was the inflation of locally produced foods.
GNA