Weekly inflation falls 1.7 percent as govt lowers petrol prices

KARACHI: Pakistan’s sensitive price indicator (SPI) offered some respite to consumers after two weeks, falling 1.70 percent as petrol prices dropped a sharp Rs40/litre, data for the week ended October 19 showed on Friday.

Annualised SPI was up 35.5 percent, easing after four weeks of staying close to 38 percent YoY. Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) attributed the decline in SPI inflation to drop in the prices of petrol (12.31%), onions (8.45%), chicken (5.46%), diesel (4.68%), pulse masoor (3.38%), sugar (3.07%), garlic (2.24%), broken basmati rice (2.17%), gur (2.17%), bananas (1.56 %), and LPG (1.17%).

On the other hand, major increase was observed in the prices of eggs (3.44%), salt (2.63%), shirting (2.18%), mutton (1.01%), beef (0.84%), cooked beef (0.72%), georgette (0.52%), washing soap (0.48%), prepared tea (0.34%), cooked daal (0.34%), potatoes (0.25%) and whole firewood (0.22%).

Topline Securities on its X, formerly Twitter account said, “Pakistan’s weekly SPI is down 1.7 percent WoW after two weeks and up 35.5 percent YoY, which is lowest after 4 weeks.”

For the week under review, SPI was recorded at 278.04 points against 282.86 points registered last week and 205.27 points recorded during the week ended October 20, 2022. PBS compiles SPI via collecting prices of 51 essential items from 50 markets in 17 cities of the country.

During the week, out of 51 items, prices of 14 (27.45 percent) items increased, 24 (47.06 percent) items decreased and 13 (25.49 percent) items remained stable.

For the groups spending up to Rs17,732; Rs17,733-22,888; Rs22,889-29,517; Rs29,518-44,175; and above Rs44,175; YoY SPI now stands at 34.96, 37.79, 36.46, 34.89, and 31.19 percent, respectively.

PBS data showed that the highest increase in SPI was once again faced by those spending Rs17,733-22,888, while the lowest impact was witnessed by those spending more than Rs44,175.

As per PBS data, YoY SPI trend depicts an increase of 35.5 percent because of a hike in prices of electricity charges for Q1 (136.89 percent), gas charges for Q1 (108.38 percent), cigarettes (94.46 percent), chilli powder (84.11 percent), broken basmati rice (81.74 percent), wheat flour (80.73 percent), rice irri-6/9 (71.43 percent), sugar (66.29 percent), gur (61.50 percent), gents sponge chappal (58.05 percent), salt (57.40 percent), and tea (56.27 percent).

The PBS noted a YoY decline in the prices of tomatoes (45.75 percent), onions (23.76 percent), pulse gram (5.63 percent), mustard oil (2.12 percent), and vegetable ghee (0.62 percent).