Thursday, January 07, 2010

Nominal fall in food inflation w-o-w basis

14.39% growth on Y-O-Y 

The index for primary articles declined by 0.7% to 282.2 for the week ended 26 December 2009 from 284.1 previous week. The annual rate of inflation, calculated on point to point basis, stood at 14.39% for the week ended 26 December 2009 over 27 December 2008.

The index for 'Food Articles' group declined by 1.0% to 284.8 from 287.7 for the previous week due to lower prices of fruits & vegetables (6%), gram (3%) and tea (1%). However, the prices of fish-marine and barley (3% each) and moong and masur (1% each) moved up. The index for 'Non-Food Articles' group rose by 0.1 % to 251.4 (Provisional) from 251.2 (Provisional) for the previous week due to higher prices of raw silk (4%), fodder and raw rubber (2% each) and cotton seed and copra (1% each). However, the prices of castor seed (3%) declined.

The index for ‘Minerals' group rose by 0.8% to 591.6 from 587.0 for the previous week due to higher prices of fire clay (57%), dolomite (52%), asbestos (29%), gypsum (28%), chromite (19%), steatite (16%), felspar (13%), phosphorite (10%), barytes (8%) and fluorite (1%). However, the prices of vermiculite (46%), ochre (20%) and magnesite (3%) declined.

The index for fuel and power group rose by 0.4% to 346.2 from 344.9 for the previous week due to higher prices of light diesel oil (5%), naphtha (3%) and furnace oil (2%). However, the prices of bitumen (1%) declined.

The annual rate of inflation, calculated on point to point basis stood at 4.85% (Provisional) for the week ended 26 December 2009 compared with 4.45% last week and (-) 0.75% during the week 26 December 2008. On week on week basis , food inflation recorded declined however the current growth in food prices is much higher compared with a year ago.