ISLAMABAD, April 24: Prices of 21 essential items spiralled during the week ending April 22 as compared to previous week, pushing the Sensitive Price Indicator further up by 0.21 per cent.
According to the weekly press review released by the Federal Bureau of Statistics here on Saturday, the SPI index moved up to 114.97 during the period under review, up 7.44 per cent from the corresponding period of the previous year.
A major factor in increase in the index was yet another upward revision of the prices of hydrocarbon fuels, including kerosene oil, petrol and diesel. Their new rates, respectively, were fixed as Rs26.22, Rs24.15 and Rs35.51 per litre, registering 3.19pc, 2.46pc and 2.33pc increase over the previous week.
Indicating the elimination of scare over poultry virus, the period under review saw the highest ever increase in the cost of chicken over the previous week: Rs8.21 per kg (15.30pc per kg) in a single week. Their average prices, based on the data collected from 17 cities, rose to Rs61.88 per kg.
The prices of remaining 17 items went up as follows: Potatoes (6.48pc), bananas (2.83pc), sugar (2.30pc), gur (0.97pc), cooked dal (plate) (0.78pc), moong pulse washed (0.48pc), rice basmati broken (0.42pc), rice basmati broken (0.40pc), coarse latha (0.40pc), mash pulse washed (0.37pc), milk fresh (0.35pc), vegetable ghee (tin) (0.32pc), masoor pulse washed (0.31pc), curd (0.29pc), red chilies (powdered) (0.21pc), mutton (0.17pc), rice Irri-6 (0.14pc) and mustard oil (0.09pc).
Out of 53 items included in the SPI basket, the prices of only 11 items decreased during the period under review. Included among these are wheat and wheat flour. Their average prices, according to the FBS data, dropped by 0.81pc and 1.10pc to Rs9.85 and Rs11.74 per kg, respectively, as compared to previous week.
Nevertheless, they cost still higher, as compared to the same period of the previous year - 15.32pc in respect of wheat flour and 14.00pc in that of wheat.
The prices of following nine items fell as follows: Tomatoes
It is presumably due to the decline in the prices of wheat and wheat flour that the SPI for the lower income households has been shown to decrease during the period under review: 0.14pc for the households with incomes up to Rs3,000 per month and 0.10pc for those in the income bracket Rs3,001-5,000.
