Experts have further warned that Nigeria’s Consumer Price Index (CPI) which measures inflationary trend may continue to escalate pending when workable economic policies are introduced and implemented religiously.
Reviewing the 12.13% year-on-year inflation increment as reported by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) Tuesday, observers say the failure of the Economic Recovery and growth Plan introduced by the government in 2017 and instances policy summersaults within the period under review, to near hyper inflation.
According to the NBS report, the latest increase was 0.15 per cent points higher than the rate recorded in December 2019, which was 11.98 per cent.
The agency further averred that that the increases were recorded in all Classification of Individual Consumption by Purposes (COICOP) divisions that yielded the headline index.
It added that month-on-month basis, the headline index increased by 0.87 per cent in January 2020 and this is 0.02 per cent rate higher than the rate recorded in December 2019, which was 0.85 per cent.
NBS said “The percentage change in the average composite CPI for the 12 months period ending January 2020, over the average of the CPI for the previous 12 months period was 11.46 per cent, showing 0.06 per cent point from 11.40 per cent recorded in December 2019.
“The urban inflation rate increased from 12.62 per cent in December to 12.78 per cent year on year in January 2020, while the rural inflation rate increased from 11.41 per cent in December 2019 to 11.54 per cent in January 2020.
“On a month-on-month basis, the urban index rose from 0.90 per cent recorded in December 2019 to 0.92 per cent in January 2020, up by 0.02 , while the rural index also rose by 0.83 per cent in January 2020, up by 0.01 from the rate recorded in December 2019, which was 0.82 per cent.
“The corresponding 12-month year-on-year average percentage change for the urban index is 11.92 per cent in January 2020. This is higher than 11.83 per cent reported in December 2019.
“While the corresponding rural inflation rate in January 2020 is 11.04 per cent compared to 11.00 per cent recorded in December 2019,” it explained.
However, the NBS report noted that the highest increase recorded was on oil and fats, fish, meat, potatoes, yam and other tubers as well as bread and cereals.
