Ghana has for the second time, recorded a drop in inflation rate since the country recorded its first case of COVID-19 in March this year.
The year-on-year inflation rate for September, which is 10.4 percent, represents a 0.1 percent drop from the 10.5 percent recorded in August this year.
This essentially means that in the month of September 2020, the general price level in Ghana was 10.4 percent higher than prices in September 2019.
Meanwhile, the month-on-month inflation between August 2020 and September 2020 was a negative of 0.2 percent.
These figures were greatly affected by the inflation rate of food prices, which contributed almost 50 percent to the annual inflation.
The Government Statistician, Professor Samuel Kobina Annim, in giving a further breakdown of these figures explained the role played by food items in the drop in inflation for September.
“Food continues to contribute closed to 50 percent of the year-on-year inflation. Food contributed 47.6 percent to the total inflation rate. This means that we are returning back to the period prior to COVID-19. Because the last time we recorded a contribution of food close to 47.6 percent was in March where food contributed 47.2 percent to the entire basket on inflation,” he explained.
Further details
The food and non-alcoholic beverages division recorded a year-on-year inflation rate of 11.2 percent. This is 0.2 percentage point lower than in August 2020 which was 11.4 percent.
Within the food division, vegetables (18.9 percent) was the subclass with the highest rates of inflation. This is lower than in the previous months.
In contrast, month-on-month food inflation was -0.5 percent, with -3.9 percent for the vegetables subclass.
Food contributed 47.6 percent to the total inflation, and thus it is still the predominant driver of year-on-year inflation. This percentage is, again, lower than the previous months and comparable to the contribution levels of food to total inflation prior to COVID-19.
Regional Inflation
The Greater Accra Region, which mostly records the highest overall year-on-year inflation rate, had a percentage point of 14.3 percent, while the Upper West Region recorded the lowest with 1.3 percent.
As on the national level, most regions recorded a lower year-on-year inflation in September compared to previous months and a low or negative month-on-month inflation rate.
Where the Upper West Region recorded the highest month-on-month inflation with 3.4 percent in August, it recorded the lowest month-on-month inflation with a negative of 6.9 percent of all regions in September.
Volta Region, however, recorded the highest month-on-month inflation of 0.1 percent.
All regions with the exception of Greater Accra showed a negative month-on-month food inflation.
Inflation rates so far
Before the announcement of the first cases of coronavirus in Ghana on March 12, 2020, inflation in the country had remained fairly stable for months as it stood at 7.8 percent from January to March.
The annual rate of inflation however jumped to 10.6 percent in April from 7.8 percent in March.
This was also driven by higher food and commodity prices due to a rush for items, in areas affected by the partial lockdown.
After witnessing general rises in the following months, with July recording an inflation rate of 11.4 percent, the month of August recorded an inflation rate of 10.5 percent.
However, the month of September saw a 0.1 percent drop in relation to that of August.