Surge in onion price negates fall in tomatoes to keep weekly inflation up
Business
Sensitive Price Indicator up 25.34pc when compared with last year
ISLAMABAD – The huge hike in the onion price ensured that the Sensitive Price Indicator (SPI) – also referred as Sensitive Price Index by some circles – moved up slightly – 0.05 per cent – during the week ending August 25 despite a large decrease in the rate of tomatoes in Pakistan.
During the week under review, prices of 22 items increased and 12 items witnessed a decline while 17 remained stable. The SPI covers a total pf 51 items.
As far as the year-on-year comparison is concerned, the SPI was up 25.34pc, which was 27.57pc during the preceding week ending August 18, thus representing a decrease, shows the data released by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS).
For week ending August 25, the increase in SPI was mainly to the rising prices of onions 23.56pc, masoor pulse 3.66pc, sugar 3.43pc, garlic 2.17pc, eggs 2.13pc and mash pulse 1.52pc.
The food items, which recorded a sizeable decrease in their average prices during the week, were tomatoes 22.16pc, chicken 5.44pc, rice irri-6/9 1.70pc, potatoes 1.43pc and bananas 1.22pc.
On the other hand, the largest increase in the prices of different food items on the year-on-year is given as: wheat flour 129.38pc, tea Lipton 93.94 per cent, rice basmati broken 89.56pc, chilies powder 86.05pc, sugar 81.21pc, rice irri-6/9 80.54pc, gur 63.59pc, salt powdered 49.09pc, chicken 48.58pc and bread 46.37pc.
In the case of non-food items, the gas tariff was up 108.38pc and the cigarettes price 102.31pc.
However, comparing the same week of the current and previous year shows a 39.96pc decrease the price of tomatoes followed by onions 37.70pc, electricity 21.96pc, masoor pulse 10.68pc and vegetable ghee 1 kg 0.40pc.
