ISLAMABAD, Feb 17: Inflation (Consumer Price Index) jumped by 3.53 per cent during July-January period of 2002-03, over the corresponding period of previous year, says the monthly review of price indices released by the Federal Bureau of Statistics (FBS).

The same period saw a spurt of 4.20 per cent in Sensitive Price Indicator (SPI) and of 5.09 per cent in Wholesale Price Index (WPI).

During January 2003, the CPI rose by 0.16 per cent, SPI by 0.23 per cent and WPI by 0.38 per cent over previous month. As compared to January 2002, these indices shot up by 3.65, 3.40 and 7.41 per cent, respectively.

The items in CPI basket are divided into 10 groups with different weightages. During January, the FBS review indicates, Medicare recorded the highest increase of 0.67 per cent over the previous month.

The CPI for the other groups, compared to previous month, surged as follows:

Food & beverages (0.07%); apparel, textile & footwear: (0.23%); house rent (0.05%), fuel & lighting (0.12%); household, furniture & equipment etc. (0.29%), transport & communication (0.52%), recreation & entertainment (0.15%), education (0.02%); and cleaning, laundry & personal appearance (0.56%).

Comparison with January 2002 shows highest increase in the group “fuel & lighting”, which includes energy. It surged by 9 per cent. The next highest increase was in transport & communication. It became dearer by 7.79 per cent. The group “education” incurred an increase of 4.98 per cent, Medicare of 3.54 per cent, food & beverages of 2.63 per cent etc.

The main commodities which showed an increase in their prices during January 2003 over December 2002 are as under:

Food & beverages: dry fruits (12.57%), eggs (9.12%), chicken (5.67%), vegetable gee (2.97%), fish (2.52%), meat (1.97%) and wheat (0.93%).

Fuel and lighting: kerosene (2.51%) and firewood (1.38%).

Transport & communication: diesel (2.70%), petrol (1.44%) and vehicles (0.97%).

Cleaning, Laundry & personal appearance: jewellery (4.89%) and laundry charges (1.50%).

Medicare: Doctor’s fee (1.30%).

Following commodities showed decrease in their prices during January 2003 from December 2002:

Food and beverages: potatoes (20.70%), onions (12.65%), pulse gram (4.48%), sugar (3.84%), besan (3.02%), gur (2.43%), gram whole (1.43%), pulse mash (1.12%) and vegetables (-1.07%).