ISLAMABAD: Weekly inflation, measured by the Sensitive Price Index (SPI), jumped by nearly 31 per cent as compared to last year, amid a big surge in the prices of foods and a couple of fuel items.

`The year-on-year (YoY) trend depicts an increase of 30.60pc,` the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) said in its weekly report on the movement in prices of 51 essential items, collected from 50 markets in 17 major cities across the country.

PBS said the SPI had been increasing in double digits since Feb 2021,with minor variations throughout FY2021-22 and FY2022-23.

The SPI is computed on a weekly basis to assess the price movement of essential commodities at short intervals.The prices are estimated to go further up in the coming week in view of the recent government decision to increase the prices of wheat flour, sugarandghee by25to62percentforsale through the Utility Stores Corporation (USC), to reduce the size of untargeted food subsidies.

The price index for the week ending on Jan5,2023recorded anincrease of around 1.1pc, which was accompanied by massive surges in the prices of certain commodities.

For example, a 501pc increase was witnessed in the prices of onions, followed by an 82.5pc increase in the price of chicken. Wheat flour and tea were also reported as being costlier by more than 45pc and 65.41pc, respectively, when compared with the same period last year.

Likewise, the prices of diesel were reported to have gone up by almost 61pc, eggs 50.51pc, powdered salt 49.50pc, petrol 48.21pc, pulse moong 47pc, broken Basmati rice 46pc, bananas 46pc and wheat flour 45pc.

On the flip side, the prices of powdered chilli dropped by 23pc while electricity costs were down 14pc, mainly because of adjustments in the fuel cost base.The data showed a massive variance of essential commodities in four provinces.

For example, a 20kg wheat flour bag cost Rs2,880 in Hyderabad, Rs2,700 in Sukkur and Quetta, Rs2,600 in Peshawar and about Rs1,295 across most of Punjab. But the national average flour price reported by PBS ranged between Rs1,295 in Punjab and Rs3,000 in Karachi.

Likewise, the highest per kg price of onions was reported from the twin cities of Rawalpindi-Islamabad (between Rs260 to Rs280), while Karachi had the lowest (between Rs180-200), while they remained between Rs200-220 in most cities of Punjab as well as Peshawar and Quetta.

Tomato prices were also lowest in Karachi (between Rs40-50 per kg) but were higher in the rest of the country and remained between Rs70-90 per kg.

The PBS report also revealed that the increase in the SPI had spread across all income groups, but the lower and middle income groups were the worst-hit.

For example, the SPI as of January 5 this year was up 33pc for the expenditure group between Rs29,500 and Rs44,175 per month, followed by 32pc for the Rs22,900-29,500 group and about 30pc for the income group spending under Rs22,900 per month group.

On a week-on-week (WoW) basis, the increase was mostly similar, between 1pc and 1.2pc.

The SPI week-on-week also increased by1.09pc during this week. A majorincreasewasobserved in the prices of food items led by chicken with 16.09pc,broken Basmati rice (5.16pc), wheat flour (4.87pc), bananas (2.97pc), onions (2.65pc), bread (1.24pc), powdered salt (1.07pc) and pulse moong (1.02pc) On the other hand, a reduction was observed in the prices of potatoes (4.61pc), eggs (1.31pc), tomatoes (1.17pc), LPG (0.85pc), vegetable ghee (0.71pc), cooking oil (0.32pc), sugar (0.24pc), and pulse masoor (0.05pc).

During the week, prices of 23 out of 51 items increased, nine items decreased and 19 items remained stable.