November 19, 2006	Sunday	Shawwal 26, 1427

ISLAMABAD, Nov 18: The price of 23 items witnessed an average growth of four per cent during the week ending on November 17, according to official figures of Federal Bureau of Statistics (FBS) released here on Saturday.

The items and price increase in percentage during the period under review as compared to the previous week. These were: onions (11.53pc), potatoes (4.98pc), Egg hen (3.79pc), garlic (2.12pc), red chillies (1.55pc), cooked beef plate (1.04pc), mustard oil (0.77pc), wheat(0.76pc), rice irri-6 (0.74pc), masoor pulse washed (0.59pc), milk fresh(0.46pc), milk powder niddo (0.41pc), curd (0.39pc), wheat flour(0.30pc), tomatoes (0.30pc), beef (0.25pc), cooking oil (0.24pc), vegetable ghee tin (0.22pc), gur (0.14 pc), mutton (0.13 pc), vegetable ghee loose (0.12pc) and rice basmati broken (0.10 pc).

The data showed that price of these items were steadily on rise during the past two to three weeks, which has badly disturbed the budget of the poor people. Most of the items were manufactured products, which showed that the increase in price could not be attributed to any shortage or any disruption in the supply side.

The week under report also saw decrease in average prices of seven essential items. These included: chicken farm (9.55pc), LPG cylinder (9.32pc), bananas (3.76pc), gram pulse washed (0.67pc), sugar (0.41pc), mash pulse washed (0.35pc) and moong pulse washed (0.06pc).