Short-term inflation rises 11.21pc on costly food

Mubarak Zeb Khan Published November 14, 2026 Updated November 14, 2026 05:26am

of the 51 items in the SPI basket, the cost of 19 rose, while prices of nine items fell during the week.—Reuters

ISLAMABAD: Short-term inflation was recorded at 11.21 per cent year-on-year in the week ending on Nov 12, driven largely by perishable food products, according to official data released by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) on Friday.

The index, comprising 51 items, whose prices are collected from 50 markets in 17 cities, is calculated weekly to track changes in the prices of essential commodities and services.

The data showed that the prices of 19 commodities increased, while those of 9 items declined. Meanwhile, the prices of 23 items remained unchanged from the previous week.

Short-term inflation has remained in the double digits for several consecutive weeks, largely due to persistently elevated petrol and diesel prices. However, oil prices have been slowly declining for the past three consecutive days.

The impact of this decline will be visible in the next review. However, the unprecedented increase in the LPG price caused short-term inflation to rise.

The SPI declined by 0.46pc week-on-week, reflecting price fluctuations in both food and non-food items.

The items that recorded the highest price increases over the previous week included tomatoes (12.06pc), eggs (5.98pc), potatoes (2.42pc), garlic (1.76pc), chicken (1.32pc), firewood (1.10pc), wheat flour (0.94pc), pulse masoor (0.64pc), beef (0.47pc), and LPG (0.30pc).

Items that recorded week-on-week price declines included petrol (7.42pc), diesel (6.10pc), onions (1.70pc), bananas (1.03pc), gur (0.59pc), sugar (0.43pc), powdered milk (0.36pc), pulse moong (0.32pc), and pulse gram (0.08pc).

On an annual basis, the items that recorded the highest price increases included LPG (111.35pc), tomatoes (78.94pc), electricity for Q1 (52.38pc), wheat flour (36.14pc), diesel (30.77pc), petrol (26.23pc), onions (19.67pc), chilli powder (15.55pc), mutton (14.67pc), bread plain (12.35pc), beef (11.30pc) and chicken (10.98pc).

In contrast, potato prices fell by 36.41pc, sugar (24.54pc), eggs (23.29pc), salt powder (12.51pc), pulse masoor (7.21pc), pulse moong (6.83pc) and gur (6.63pc).

Published in Dawn, November 14th, 2026

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Mubarak Zeb Khan is a senior staff correspondent for Dawn, bringing over two decades of experience to his coverage of political economy, trade, taxation, and public finance. He is a former Innovation Journalism fellow at Stanford University and a Chevening Scholar. He tweets @mubarakzebdawn.