Islamabad, Jan 4: The Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) reported a 3.97% year-on-year increase in inflation measured by the Sensitive Price Index (SPI) for the week ending January 2, 2024. This surge highlights significant price hikes in key commodities and services over the past year.
Notable year-on-year increases were observed in items such as tomatoes (up by 77.84%), ladies’ sandals (75.09%), and potatoes (66.63%). Other significant contributors included pulse gram (47.53%), pulse moong (30.73%), powdered milk (25.62%), and beef (23.94%). Additionally, utility costs like gas charges for Q1 (15.52%) and essential household goods like cooked daal (15.10%) and firewood (13.18%) also saw marked increases.
Conversely, certain commodities experienced year-on-year price decreases, notably wheat flour (down 36.12%), onions (29.95%), and powdered chilies (20.00%). Other declines were recorded in essential staples like rice basmati broken (8.42%) and fuel products, with diesel and petrol prices dropping by 6.39% and 5.45%, respectively.
On a week-on-week basis, however, the SPI indicated a 0.26% decline, reflecting short-term reductions in prices for some essential items. Tomatoes saw the steepest weekly decrease at 13.48%, followed by electricity charges for Q1 (7.48%), potatoes (5.59%), and eggs (0.23%). Meanwhile, the prices of 47.06% of monitored items remained unchanged during the week, while 33.33% increased and 19.61% decreased.
The mixed trend of inflation highlights the complexities of Pakistan’s economic landscape, where year-on-year price surges in key commodities continue to strain household budgets despite occasional short-term relief. Monitoring and addressing these fluctuations remain critical to ensuring stability in consumer purchasing power and economic growth.
