Staff Reporter
Islamabad
The inflation rate eased for the fourth successive month and stood at 8.2% in May 2020 despite a seasonal spike in prices of essential food items, Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) reported on Monday.
However, the pace of reduction slowed down last month due to rise in prices of food items during Ramazan that partially offset the impact of fall in petroleum product prices.
The 8.2% inflation reading was the lowest in the past 11 months. Last time in June 2019, inflation had been recorded at 8% – the level from where it had started rising and peaked at 14.6% in January this year.
Economic activities that largely remained at a standstill due to partial lockdown in the country in the wake of Covid-19 pandemic, were restored significantly in the second half of May.
The pace of inflation slowed down both in urban and rural areas. PBS calculates the reading by monitoring prices of 356 commodities in 35 cities and 244 goods in 27 rural markets.
The inflation rate eased to 7.3% in urban areas and to 9.7% in rural areas. However, food inflation rose both in urban and rural areas.
The food inflation in urban areas that stood at 10.4% in the preceding month, increased to 10.6% in May. In rural areas, the pace of food inflation surged from 12.9% in April to 13.7% last month.
Prices of a majority of perishable food items went up compared to the preceding month.
Food inflation in May escalated by 1.63% on a month-on-month basis due to a considerable hike in prices of key kitchen items including chicken, potato and onion.
Owing to its higher weight, the food inflation offset a 15% reduction in domestic fuel prices, which pushed down the transport index by 6.5% month-on-month. Core inflation, calculated by excluding food and energy prices, went down in urban and rural areas.
