Daily Times

The Sensitive Price Indicator (SPI) based weekly inflation for the week ended on October 28, 2021 for the combined consumption group has witnessed a massive increase of 1.23 percent, the fourth in a row, while it went 14.31 percent up on a year-on-year (YoY) basis.

Earlier, during the previous weeks ended on October 21, October 14 and October 07, the weekly inflation went up by 1.38 percent, 0.20 percent and 1.21 percent, respectively.

According to data released by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) on Friday, the combined index was at 163.44 on October 28, 2021 as compared to 161.46 on October 21, 2021 while the index was recorded at 142.98 a year ago on October 29, 2020.

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 comprises 51 essential items and the prices are being collected from 50 markets in 17 cities of the country.

During the week under review, out of 51 items, prices of 25 (49.02 percent) items increased, prices of four (7.84 percent) items decreased and prices of 22 (43.14 percent) items remained stable. The SPI for the current week recorded an increase in the prices of tomatoes (11.42pc), potatoes (6.05pc), LPG (3.89pc), sugar (3.74pc), eggs (3.16pc), electricity for Q1 (2.98pc), mustard oil (1.39pc), gur (1.36pc), chicken (1.09pc) and cooking oil 5-litre (1.08pc) with joint impact of (1.18pc) into the overall SPI for combined group of (1.23pc). On the other hand, a decrease was observed in the prices of onions (5.49pc), bananas (3.51pc), pulse Moong (0.80pc) and garlic (0.38pc).

According to the PBS data, the year on year trend depicts increase of 14.31pc, LPG (80.06pc), electricity for Q1 (65.91pc), mustard oil (47.88pc), vegetable ghee 1-kg (44.61pc), cooking oil 5-litre (42.30pc), chillies powdered (33.43pc), petrol (32.22pc), chicken (31.52pc), diesel (28.91pc), washing soap (27.98pc) and garlic (24.37pc), while major decrease observed in the prices of tomatoes (47.12pc), onions (35.90pc), pulse Moong (32.33pc), potatoes (19.24pc) and pulse Mash (0.79pc).

The weekly SPI percentage change by income groups showed that SPI across all quantiles ranged between 1.01 percent and 1.40 percent. The lowest income group witnessed a weekly increase of 1.29 percent while the highest income group recorded an increase of 1.40 percent.

On a yearly basis, analysis of SPI change across different income segments showed that SPI increased across all quantiles ranging between 12.40 percent and 15.01 percent. Yearly SPI for the lowest income group increased by 15.01 percent while the highest income group recorded an increase of 14.97 percent.