Inflation down to 2.1% in December

The Department of Census and Statistics (DCS) has released the National Consumer Price Index (NCPI) and Inflation for the month of December 2018.The moving average inflation for the month of December 2018 is 2.1%. The corresponding rate for the month of November 2018 was 2.7%.

The NCPI for all items for the month of December 2018 was 127.1. A decrease of 0.6 index points that is percentage of -0.5 was reported in December 2018 compared to that of November 2018 for which the index was 127.7.This decrease represents decrease in expenditure value of Rs. 182.44 in the “Market Basket.

The decrease in the index point by 0.44% was due to the expenditure value decreases of food items by 0.17% and non-food items by 0.27% respectively. The overall rate of inflation as measured by NCPI on year on year (YoY) basis is 0.4% in December 2018 and inflation calculated for November 2018 was 1 % Y on Y inflation of food group has decreased from -3.9% in November 2018 to -4.5% in December 2018 and that of non-food group has also decreased from 5.2% to 4.7% during this month.

On year on year basis, contribution of food commodities to inflation was -2.08 percent in December 2018 compared to that of December 2017.Contribution of non food items was 2.49 %