As food inflation continues to impact strongly on national inflation, Economist, Dr. Patrick Asuming is urging Government to introduce more policies and programs to boost domestic production as part of efforts to check the rising inflation rate in the country.
National inflation has accelerated to hit 19.4% in March 2022, the highest since 2009. The rate is a 3.7 percentage points higher than the 15.7 percent recorded in February 2022.
According to him, this situation is only going to get worse if the situation between Russia and Ukraine does not die down.
In an interview with Citi Business News, Dr. Patrick Asuming however he notes that boosting domestic production of food will help keep the inflation rate in check.
The Consumer Price Index (CPI) which informs the rate of inflation in Ghana measures the changes in the price of a fixed basket of goods and services that households in Ghana consumes.
The said basket which the service uses for calculating inflation, contains food and non-food items and helps in appreciating the average price levels in the country.
According to data from the Ghana Statistical Service, the latest rate of inflation, that is 19.4 % for the third month of the year 2022, is the highest since 2009
The new rise in the inflation rate comes as no surprise to many economists and stakeholders as prices of fuel and food will continue to rise following tensions between Ukraine and Russia.
The 19.4 percent increase in March was mainly influenced by the increase in the prices associated with Food, Transport and Housing.
Food inflation has deepened its dominance over non-food inflation recording 22.4% as against the 17.4 percent recorded in the previous month and relative to the rate of non-food inflation of 17.0%.
However, on a month-on-month basis, the difference between food inflation and non-food inflation was relatively smaller as food inflation stood at 5% relative to 3.7 that was recorded for non-food inflation.
