The weekly inflation, measured by the Sensitive Price Indicator (SPI), increased by 0.73 percent for the combined consumption group during the week ended on November 27, the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) reported on Friday.
According to the PBS data, the SPI for the week under review was recorded at 337.99 points, up from 335.54 points last week. On a year-on-year basis, the SPI rose by 4.32 percent. The weekly SPI (base year 2015-16=100) covers 17 urban centres and 51 essential items for all expenditure groups. For the lowest consumption group (up to Rs17,732), the SPI decreased by 0.09 percent, falling to 330.88 points from 331.17 points last week. The SPI for consumption groups of Rs17,733-22,888; Rs22,889-29,517; Rs29,518-44,175; and above Rs44,175 increased by 0.99 percent, 0.49 percent, 0.28 percent, and 0.60 percent, respectively. During the week, out of 51 items, prices of 14 (27.45%) items increased, 12 (23.53%) decreased, and 25 (49.02%) remained unchanged.
Major commodities registering an increase during the week included electricity charges for Q1 (11.11%), LPG (3.51%), pulse moong (1.92%), vegetable ghee 2.5-kg (1.12%), bananas (0.65%), cooking oil 5-litre (0.64%), powdered milk (0.43%), vegetable ghee 1-kg (0.38%), cigarettes (0.25%), firewood (0.20%), sugar (0.20%) and beef (0.01%). Items showing a decline in prices during the week included tomatoes (28.39%), onions (10.08%), potatoes (4.58%), salt powdered (2.47%), pulse gram (1.18%), garlic (1.12%), eggs (0.75%) and wheat flour (0.70%).
On a year-on-year basis, major increases were observed in the prices of sugar (44.09%), gas charges for Q1 (29.85%), wheat flour (16.35%), gur (16.24%), beef (13.46%), firewood (12.74%), diesel (11.66%), bananas (11.27%), vegetable ghee 2.5-kg (9.17%), powdered milk (8.64%), lawn printed (8.29%) and cooking oil 5-litre (7.61%). Commodities showing year-on-year decline included garlic (38.54%), potatoes (34.96%), pulse gram (28.96%), tomatoes (26.64%), onions (19.05%), tea packete (17.79%), pulse mash (14.97%), electricity charges for Q1 (8.40%), salt powdered (4.23%) and LPG (2.54%).