August 14, 2002	Wednesday	Jamadi-us-Saani 4, 1423

ISLAMABAD, Aug 13: Inflation based on Consumer Price Index (CPI) spiralled by 3.97 per cent in July 2002, the highest increase for that month since 2000.

Indicating a new round of price hikes, the price data released by the Federal Bureau of Statistics here on Tuesday, showed that the Sensitive Price Indicator (SPI) spurted even higher — 5.33 in a single month of July. In the same month of 2000-01, it had gone up 3.80% but slid to 1.85% in the comparable period of 2001-02.

The Wholesale Price Index surged by 2.17% in the first month of 2002-03 — albeit lower than 2000-01 (3.26%) and 2001-02 (6.51%).

When compared with the previous month (June 2002) too, all the three price indices reflect a fast track progression. Thus CPI soared 1.09%, SPI 1.48% and WPI 1.51% over the preceding month. In the same month of 2000-01 and 2001-02, CPI had increased by 0.56% and 1.53%, respectively.

SPI in July 2002 went up 1.48% over June of previous year, as compared to 0.77% in 2000-01 and 0.62% in 2001-02.

WPI recorded the highest increase in July 2002 among the three indices — 1.51% as compared to June 2002. In July 2001, WPI had gone up by 1.78% over June 2000, but decreased by 0.08% from June 1999.

For the first time in a long time, the food group with a weightage of 40.34% in the new CPI, eclipsed all the other groups: It surged by 2.54% in a single month when compared to June 2002.

Medicare was the next category in CPI to be hit by the galloping inflation with an increase of 0.70% as compared to previous month.

The increase in CPI for other groups as compared to June 2002 was as follows:

Education (0.33%); household, furniture & equipment etc. (0.29%); apparel, textile & footwear (0.15%); house rent (0.03%); fuel & lighting (0.07%); transport & communication (0.20%); recreation & entertainment (0.00%); and cleaning, laundry & personal appearance (0.19%).

A comparison with July 2001 further reflects a disturbing trend with especial impact on the lowest as well as middle income strata:

The inflation for three major groups has outstripped the CPI for the previous 13 months. During that period it had gone up by 6.04%. As against this, the price index for fuel & lighting surged by 6.49% while Medicare became costlier by 6.36% over corresponding period of previous year.

The main commodities which showed an increase in their prices during July 2002 over June 2002 are as under: Food and beverages: Tomatoes (19.39%), vegetables (16.02%), cooking oil (13.98%), eggs (9.88%), cigarettes (8.09%), potatoes (6.79%), vegetable ghee (5.49%), chicken farm (5.08%), dry fruit (4.61%), wheat (3.19%), onions (2.99%), sugar (2.73%), wheat flour (1.57%), meat (1.47%), mustard oil (1.42%), gur (1.36%), rice (1.09%) and sweetmeat & nimco (1.00%). Medicare: Doctor’s fee (1.14%).

As against 18 foodstuffs mentioned above which became dearer during the period under review, slight decreases are reported by the FBS data in prices of only four foodstuffs as follows: Fresh fruits (2.81%), gram whole (1.37%), pulse masoor (1.25%) and besan (0.97%).

Broad details about WPI also reflect significant rise in prices of raw materials and intermediate goods produced within the country, as compared to June 2002 as follows: Cotton (5.66%), mustardseed (2.84%), cottonseed (1.86%), other oils (4.33%), cotton yarn (1.99%), woollen textiles (1.39%) and fertilizers (1.37%).