ISLAMABAD, Dec 21: Sensitive Price Indicator (SPI) moved down slightly by 0.10 per cent during the week ending December 19 as compared to previous week, according to the Federal Bureau of Statistics issued here on Saturday.

A noteworthy feature of the decline experienced for the third consecutive week was that the households with incomes above Rs12,000 per month incurred a marginal increase of 0.07% in SPI.

Highest decrease in prices was reported by the FBS in respective of lowest income households with monthly incomes up to Rs3000 — 0.32%. Households with incomes in the range Rs3001-5000 and Rs5001-12000, plummeted by 0.31% and 0.23%, respectively.

Consequently, the SPI index stood at 106.64 at the end of the period under review — the lowest in five weeks. As compared to the corresponding period of previous year, the SPI was up by 3.16%.

In the FBS’s computation, the rise in SPI for relatively affluent households was accountable to increase in prices of consumer items affordable only by this class. These were petrol and eggs (farm). Their average prices, on the basis of the rates collected by the FBS staff in 17 towns, soared by 2.53% and 7.78%, respectively, over the previous week.

The other 13 items that became more expensive during the period under review, as compared to previous week, were:

Mutton (1.49%), kerosene (0.96%), moong pulse washed (0.63%), firewood (0.58%), beef (0.52%), bananas (0.36%), wheat (0.34%), wheat flour average quality (0.29%), mash pulse washed (0.24%), vegetable ghee (loose) (0.18%), garlic (0.17%), masoor pulse (0.06%) and coarse latha (0.04%).

The drop in SPI is explained by significant drop in average prices of tomatoes, potatoes and onions. Presumably due to seasonal factors, their prices registered declines of 16.32%, 11.71% and 10.26%, respectively. Apart from these, prices of six other items too climbed down as follows:

Gram pulse washed (1.30%), sugar (0.98%), chicken farm (0.85%), red chilies (powdered) (0.68%), gur (0.30%) and mustard oil (0.20%).

According to the newly introduced table on “wage rates”, the wage of labourer increased by 0.26% and that of electrician by 0.28% over the previous week. Thus their average daily wages, based on data collected from 17 towns, went up from Rs116.06 to Rs117.06 for labourer and from Rs39.24 to Rs39.35 per point for electrician.

Besides petrol, the prices of diesel too were revised upward during the period under review, that is, by 0.99% over the previous week. Thus the prices of diesel soared by 57.11% over the corresponding week of previous year. The LPG (standard cylinder) also went up in price by 0.15% over the previous week. As compared to the same period of previous year, it was dearer by 47.14%.

The prices of cement, however, showed consistent decline. As their prices dipped below Rs200 in a number of cities, the highest was Rs230 per bag — and that too in Quetta.