The Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the Cabinet has allowed Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) to publish price statistics with new base 2007-08 with old base 2015-16 for comparative purposes, official sources told Business Recorder. Ministry of Planning, Development & Reform (Pakistan Bureau of Statistics) stated that the Governing Council of Pakistan Bureau of Statistics issued a policy directive to rebase price statistics from 2007-08 to 2015-16. In this regard, a technical committee comprising 30 members from pubic and private sector was constituted to review the present technology for Consumer Price Index (CPI) and to propose a new methodology for computation of CPI with base year 2015-16.
In the fifth meeting of the technical committee, it was recommended to change base year for price statistics from 2007-28 to 2015-16 with introduction of Rural Price Index along with urban and National Price Index. The new base year 2015-16 has the following features: (i) inclusion of rural markets; (ii) introduction of population weights based on recent population census, 2017; (iii) computation indices based on weighted geometric mean; (iv) introduction of consumption quintiles of income quintiles; (v) introduction of consumer weighted approach to compute gas prices for combined income group; and (vi) introduction of GST, other taxes, fuel price adjustment to compute electricity tariff using consumer weighted approach.
Ministry of Planning, Development & Reform (Pakistan Bureau of Statistics) further stated that the Governing Council in its 17th meeting held on April 6, 2019 approved the change of base price statistics from 2007-08 to 2015-16. Ministry of Planning, Development & Reform requested the ECC to accord approval for implementation of change of base of price statistics from 2007-08 to 2015-16.
During the ensuing discussion, the EC observed that Governing Council of Pakistan Bureau of Statistics(PBS), is fully competent to take decision regarding change of base of price statistics, therefore, the ECC endorsed its decision regarding change of base of prices statistics from 2007- 08 to 2015-16.
The ECC directed Planning, Development and Reform Division/PBS to publish price statistics with new base 2007-08 from July 2019. However, the price statistics with old base 2015-17 will also be published for one year for comparative purposes.
Comments
Comments are closed.