ISLAMABAD, April 14: Prices of 13 essential kitchen items, including tomatoes, registered a substantial increase during the week ended April 13, 2007, over the previous week, statistics division said on Saturday.

Among kitchen items, the price of tomatoes witnessed a double digit growth for the last two weeks because of shortage of the commodity in the local market. However, edible oil price is steadily on the rise for the last many months, but the government is yet to take any action in this regard.Official figures released here by the Federal Bureau of Statistics (FBS) showed that price of tomatoes increased by 19.83 per cent to Rs16.98 per kg as against Rs14.17; an increase of 2.95 per cent in vegetable ghee, which stood at Rs77 per kg during the week under review as against Rs74.79.

The price of red chillies increased by 1.72 per cent to Rs107.40 per kg from Rs105.58, latha 1.20 per cent to Rs35.55 per metre as against Rs35.12, 0.55 per cent in voil printed to Rs38.28 per metre as against Rs38.02, LPG 11 kg cylinder 0.52 per cent to Rs589 per cylinder from Rs585.94; rice basmati broken 0.43 per cent to Rs25.83 per kg as against Rs25.72, bath soap lifebuoy 0.42 per cent to Rs14.24 per cake as against Rs14.18, lawn 0.36 per cent to Rs79.88 per metre as against Rs79.59.

The price of masoor washed increased by 0.33 per cent to Rs46.13 per kg as against Rs45.98, curd 0.16 per cent to Rs31.72 per kg as against Rs31.67, mustard oil 0.14 per cent to Rs83.78 per kg as against Rs83.66 and mash washed by 0.10 per cent to Rs71.62 per kg as against Rs71.55.

Weekly inflation measured through sensitive price indictor (SPI) rose by 0.01 per cent during the week ending April 13 as compared to the previous week. The increase in SPI was recorded for all income groups except the income group beyond Rs12, 000.The increase in overall SPI was mainly due to increase in prices of food items which was more for those people whose income was less than Rs12,000 per month.