DAR ES SALAAM: Tanzania's annual inflation rate eased for a fifth straight month in January, helped by slower rises in food and fuel costs, the statistics office said on Monday.
Inflation fell to 4.0 percent in January on a year-on-year basis from 4.8 percent in December, the state-run National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said, beating the government's target of 5.0 percent inflation by June this year.
Month-on-month inflation was 1.0 percent in January, up from a reading of 0.2 percent in December.
"The decrease of the annual headline inflation rate for the year ending January 2015 was caused by slower rises in the prices of food and non-food items such as fuel," Ephraim Kwesigabo, director of population census and social statistics at NBS told a news conference.
Kwesigabo said food and non-alcoholic beverages inflation rate had decreased to 4.9 percent in January 2015 from 5.7 percent recorded in December.
Food and fuel prices are the biggest drivers of the inflation rate in Tanzania.
The east African nation enjoyed a bumper crop of cereals like maize and rice last year after good rainfall in the growing regions of the south and north of the country.
Last week Tanzania's energy regulator cut the retail prices of petrol, diesel and kerosene for the fifth straight month to reflect lower import costs after global oil prices extended their slide.
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