Weekly inflation jumps 0.92pc WoW as chicken, sugar prices soar

KARACHI: Weekly inflation jumped up 0.92 percent week-on-week and 44.49 percent year-on-year during the seven-day period ended April 6, as prices of sugar and chicken surged on account of Ramazan and likely hoarding.

Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) data attributed the decline in the sensitive price indicator (SPI) to the rise in prices of chicken (15.87 percent), sugar (13.48 percent), potatoes (5.11 percent), bananas (4.95 percent), wheat flour (3.10 percent), gur (2.12 percent), long cloth (1.95 percent), eggs (1.26 percent), and fresh milk (1.24 percent).

On the other hand, a decrease was observed in the prices of tomatoes (14.96 percent), onions (12.66 percent), LPG (3.73 percent), pulse gram (1.20 percent), vegetable ghee 2.5kg (0.71 percent), garlic (0.16 percent) and mustard oil (0.03 percent).

For the week under review, SPI was recorded at 252.06 points against 249.75 points registered last week and 174.45 points recorded during the week ended April 7, 2022. Fahad Rauf, head of research at Ismail Iqbal Securities said that SPI experienced an increase, mainly driven by 16 percent and 13 percent increase in chicken and sugar prices, respectively.

“After declining for five consecutive weeks, chicken prices have now reversed trend, likely due to an increase in demand during Ramazan. In sugar’s case, news reports suggest that there is an element of hoarding along with the Ramazan factor,” he said.

With Eid season approaching, food prices are expected to remain elevated. “We expect April 2023 CPI (consumer price index) to come around 39-40 percent on YoY basis,” Rauf added.

According to the PBS data, the average price of broiler chicken surged 15.87 percent WoW and 41.68 percent YoY to stand at Rs378.39/kg. During the same week last year, a kilogram of chicken was being sold for Rs267.07 on average.

City-wise breakdown showed that the highest price of chicken was recorded in Khuzdar, where it was sold for Rs500/kg on average. It was followed by Karachi, where the average price of the commodity was Rs419.54/kg during the week under review.

However, in some local markets of Karachi, chicken was being sold at Rs480/kg as per Noman, a resident of the central district. “When I buy chicken on Sunday, it is even more expensive compared to the rest of the week,” he lamented. A chicken vendor agreed that prices on Sunday went up because of higher demand on weekends.

A huge jump was also noted in the prices of sugar and wheat flour. The price of the sweetener climbed up by Rs14.64/kg WoW and Rs36.65/kg YoY to stand at Rs123.27/kg, whereas the price of wheat flour went up by Rs81.66/20kg WoW and Rs1,544.72/20kg YoY to stand at Rs2,717.45/20kg.

PBS compiles SPI via collecting prices of 51 essential items from 50 markets in 17 cities of the country. During the week, out of 51 items, prices of 27 (52.94 percent) items increased, 7 (13.73 percent) items decreased and prices of 17 (33.33 percent) items remained unchanged.

The PBS data attributed the YoY rise in SPI to the jump in the prices of cigarettes (165.88 percent), wheat flour (131.72 percent), gas charges for Q1 (108.38 percent), diesel (102.84 percent), eggs (98.34 percent), tea lipton (97.63 percent), broken basmati rice (84.92 percent), bananas (82.23 percent), petrol (81.17 percent), rice irri-6/9 (80.61 percent), pulse moong (68.14 percent), potatoes (65.95 percent), pulse mash (56.70 percent) and onions (55.75 percent).

Decrease was observed in the prices of tomatoes (50.39 percent) and chili powder (6.48 percent).

For the groups spending up to Rs17,732; Rs17,733-22,888; Rs22,889-29,517; Rs29,518-44,175; and above Rs44,175; YoY SPI increased 40.43, 43.42, 43.85, 44.22, and 46.47 percent respectively.