Average inflation eases
The non-food inflation jumped to 11.45 per cent last year mainly because of price hike of electricity, house rent and other non-food items.
In 2011, the non-food inflation was 6.83 per cent, Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics said on Tuesday.
According to the BBS data released on the day, the food inflation, however, decreased to 7.43 per cent in 2012 from that of 12.83 per cent in 2011.
The point-to-point inflation on average also eased by 1.96 percentage point to stand at 8.74 per cent in 2012.
In 2011, the overall inflation rate was 10.70 per cent.
‘The government has succeeded to keep the overall inflation rate low after the country experienced high inflation in 2011,’ BBS director general Golam Mostafa Kamal said at a press briefing at the bureau’s conference room in the city.
The BBS data, however, showed that the point-to-point inflation rose in December, two months in a row, by 0.28 percentage point to 7.69 per cent as per the inflation calculation based on the base-year of 1995-1996.
After nine months of downtrend, the point-to-point inflation increased by 0.19 percentage point and stood at 7.41 per cent in November last year.
Golam Mostafa said that despite a decrease in the non-food inflation, the overall inflation had increased in December mainly due to a rise in prices of food items including rice, atta, pulse, fish, meat, spice, vegetable oil and milk.
The BBS data showed that food inflation had increased by 0.88 percentage point to 7.33 per cent in December from that of 6.45 per cent in November.
In December, the non-food inflation decreased to 8.43 per cent, which was 9.31per cent a month ago.
In reply to the question whether the inflation would go up further in the coming months due to the recent fuel price hike, Golam Mostafa said that BBS was not able to say anything right now about the possible impact of the price hike on the inflation situation.
‘But, it is generally deemed that the cost of living increases due to such price hike of fuel,’ he said.
The BBS data showed that on monthly basis, the overall inflation increased by 0.19 per cent and the food inflation increased by 0.08 per cent in December compared with those in the previous month because of a rise in prices of some food items.
The non-food inflation also rose by 0.41 per cent mainly due to a price increase of clothes, furniture and household items and cost of transportation, education materials and miscellaneous goods and services, the data showed.
In December, the inflation in clothing and footwear sectors rose by 1.08 per cent, gross rent and fuel and lighting sectors by 0.14 per cent, furniture, furnishing and household equipments by 0.49 per cent, medical care and health expenses by 0.23 per cent, transport and communication by 0.34 per cent, recreation, entertainment, education and cultural services by 0.45 per cent and miscellaneous goods and services by 0.43 per cent compared with those in November, the BBS data showed.
In the urban areas, the point-to-point inflation rate was 9 per cent in December and in the rural areas it was 7.17 per cent in the month.
In November, the inflation was 8.97 per in the urban areas and 6.80 per cent in the rural areas.
According to the base-year of 2005-2006, the average inflation also fell to 6.22 per cent in 2012 from that of 11.43 per cent in 2011.
The food inflation on average also declined to 3.38 per cent in 2012 from that of 11.83 per cent in 2011 while the non-food inflation increased to 10.73 per cent last year, which was 7.80 per cent a year ago.
As per the 2005-2006 base-year, the point-to-point inflation and the food inflation increased in December while the non-food inflation decreased in the month compared with that in November.
The overall inflation rose to 7.14 per cent, the food inflation increased to 5.28 per cent and the non-food inflation declined to 10.03 per cent in December from that of 6.55 per cent, 3.94 per cent and 10.68 per cent respectively in November.
Courtesy of New Age
