Inflation of imported goods was 4.8%, while the inflation of local goods was 14.1% on average in May 2020, the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS), has announced on Wednesday, June 10.
According to the GSS, this is the highest rate of local inflation and the lowest rate of imported goods inflation since the rebasing in August 2019.
Month-on-month inflation for imported goods was 0.8%, while month-on-month inflation for local goods was 2.1%. The main contributor to local inflation was the inflation of locally produced foods.
Meanwhile, the GSS said the overall year-on-year inflation ranged from 3.1% in the Upper East Region to 13.3% in Greater Accra, the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS), has announced on Wednesday, June 10.
The GSS said when comparing Food to Non-Food inflation, there are clear differences between regions.
Ashanti (22.3%) and Western Region (19.8%) had the highest rates of Food inflation, while Eastern Region saw the highest Non-Food inflation (12.8%).
The Upper East, Northern, Eastern, and Volta Regions experienced higher Non-Food than Food inflation, the opposite was true for the other six regions.
The month-on-month inflation rate between regions also differ.
The overall month-on-month inflation was between -1.5% in the Volta Region and 3.9% in the Ashanti Region.
The Western Region recorded a month-on-month Food inflation rate of 6.9%, while the Volta Region saw a decrease of -3.3%.
Greater Accra saw overall month-on-month inflation of 0.7% and a Food month-on-month inflation of -0.4%. See Figure 5, for the other regional month-on-month inflation rates.
The Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages Division recorded a year-on-year inflation rate of 15.1%. This is 0.7 percentage point higher than April 2020 (14.4%) and 7.2 percentage points higher than the average over the eight months preceding March 2020 (7.9%).
This translates to Food being the predominant driver of year-on-year inflation. Food contributed 58.6% of the year-on-year inflation in April 2020.
Month-on-month Food inflation stood at 2.3%, which is less than the 6.4% that was recorded between March 2020 and April 2020.
The Division with the highest month-on-month inflation between April and March 2020 was Housing, Water, Electricity and Gas (4.3%).
In the previous two months, the majority of Divisions recorded higher month-on-month inflation rates than the average month-on-month inflation rates between October 2019 and March 2020.
Month-on-month Transport inflation was on average +0.3% between October 2019 and March 2020, but -1.7% between March and April and – 0.6% between April and May. Within the Food Division, Vegetables (34.9%) and Fruits and Nuts (21.5% ) were the Subclasses with the highest rates of inflation.
For the Housing Division, the Subclasses Rents Paid by Tenants (21.0%) and Refuse Collection (48.9%) recorded the highest inflation rates. Month-on-month Transport inflation was negative due to the month-on-month price indices decreases for Diesel (-10.9%) and Petrol (-8.7%).
The national year-on-year inflation rate was 11.3% in May 2020, which is 0.7 percentage points higher than last month, the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS), has announced.
Month-on-month inflation between April 2020 and May 2020 was 1.7%, the GSS added.
This is lower than the 3.2% recorded between March and April 2020, but higher than the average month-on-month inflation recorded in the months October 2019 to March 2020 (0.7%).
Only two of the thirteen Divisions had higher than average inflation rates; Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages and Housing, Water, Electricity and Gas (both 15.1%).
