ISLAMABAD: Weekly inflation for combined income group measured through the Sensitive Price Index (SPI) eased by 0.12 percent for the week ended on November 5, 2020 as opposed to the previous week.

The Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) data released on Friday showed the decrease was mainly owing to a fall in prices of food items -tomatoes (25.22%), wheat flour (3.82%), moong (2.03%), sugar (1.91%), gur (1.20%), rice basmati broken (1.16%), beef (0.60%), rice Irri (0.52%), bananas (0.44%), eggs (0.34%), vegetable ghee 2.5kg (0.18%), and cooking oil 5 liter (0.16%), and among non-food items petrol (1.46%), diesel (0.78%) with joint impact of negative (100) into the overall SPI for combined group.

On the other hand, an increase was observed in the prices of chicken (9.04%), LPG (6.40%), onions (6.39%), garlic (4.21%), potatoes (3.50%), fire wood (1.89%), shirting (1.41%), and long cloth (1.28%), during the week.

According to the PBS, out of 51 items, prices of 14 items increased, while the prices of 14 items decreased, while prices of 23 remained unchanged. The year-on-year trend depicts an increase of 8.93% with most of the items increased mainly chilies powder (86.31%), potatoes (62.49%), eggs (46.55%), sugar (38.91%), chicken (28.61%), mash (27.20%), moong (25.53%), masoor (22.00%), match box (20.80%), Sufi washing soap (20.47%), gur (18.34%), vegetable ghee 1kg (16.67%), bread (16.66%), long cloth (16.42%), and mustard oil (16.18%).

While a major decrease was observed in the price of diesel (18.84%), garlic (16.08%), petrol (10.25%), electricity (7.04%), onions (5.71%), and LPG (1.83%). The SPI is computed on weekly basis to assess the price movements of essential commodities at shorter interval of time, so as to review the price situation in the country. The SPI comprises 51 essential items and the prices are being collected from 50 markets in 17 cities of the country.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020