Retail inflation rises to 5.54% in September; food inflation at 7.74%

Retail inflation rose to 5.54% in September, while food inflation accelerated to 7.74%, according to government data released on Monday.

The year-on-year Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation rate stood at 4.83% in August, while food inflation, measured by the Consumer Food Price Index (CFPI), was 5.97%.

The data released by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation is based on the new CPI series with 2024 as the base year.

Retail inflation in rural areas rose to 6.08% in September from 5.24% in August. In urban areas, it increased to 4.88% from 4.31%.

Food inflation in rural areas accelerated to 8.06% from 6.17% in August, while the urban rate rose to 7.18% from 5.64%.

Among individual items, onion prices recorded the highest inflation at 108.09% in September, sharply up from 48.78% in August.

Inflation in silver jewellery stood at 87.80%, while ginger prices rose 62.85% year-on-year. Garlic inflation accelerated to 54.62% from 43.60% in August.

Lemon prices recorded inflation of 36.41%, compared with 15.15% in the previous month.

However, potato prices declined 11.50% year-on-year in September, while tomato prices fell 8.62%.

Prices of motor cars and jeeps declined 4.51%, while lady's finger prices fell 4.48%. Coconut prices were down 3.99%.

Last week, the Reserve Bank hiked the benchmark lending rate (repo) by 25 basis points to 5.50% amid inflationary concerns.

It projected CPI inflation at 4.9% in the second quarter, 6% in the third quarter and 5.7% in the fourth quarter. Inflation for the first quarter of the next fiscal has been projected at 5.6%, with risks evenly balanced.