Surging food prices, transport fares, push inflation to 23.6% in April 2022

Surging food prices once again drove inflation for the month of April, 2022 to 23.6%, figures from the Ghana Statistical Service has revealed.

This is the highest since January 2004.

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According to the GSS, four divisions – Transport (33.5%); Household Equipment and Routine Maintenance (28.5%); Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages (25.6%), and Housing, Water, Electricity, Gas and Other Fuels (25.0%) recorded inflation rates above the national average of 23.6% with Transport recording the highest inflation.

National month-on-month inflation from March 2022 to April 2022 was 5.1%.

Whilst Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages inflation was 26.6%, Non-Food inflation stood at 21.3%.

April 2022 food inflation (26.6%) is higher than both March 2022 food inflation (22.4%) and the average of the previous 12 months (13.5%). Food inflation’s contribution to total inflation however, decreased from 51.4% in March 2022 to 50.0% in April 2022

All the 15 food subclasses recorded positive month-on-month inflation with Fruit and Vegetable Juices recording the highest (15.3%).

For Non-Food inflation, year-on-year inflation on average went up again in April 2022 compared to March 2022 (from 17.0% to 21.3%). Only one out of the 12 Non-food Divisions had the 12 months rolling average to be higher than the year-on-year inflation for April 2022 for the divisions.

Furthermore, the inflation for imported goods was 24.7% which is higher than the 17.3% recorded for March 2022 while the inflation for locally produced items was 23.0% up from the 20.0% recorded in March 2022. This is the first time in 29 months that inflation for imported items exceeded domestic inflation.

Government Statistician, Professor Samuel Kobina Anim, called on policy makers to address the rising prices of goods and services in the country.

Upper East records lowest inflation rate of 18.4%

Meanwhile, the Upper East region recorded the lowest inflation rate of 18.4%. However the Central region registered the highest inflation rate of 26.7%.

Greater Accra recorded an inflation rate of 25.1%, whereas the Ashanti region recorded an inflation rate of 21.7%.

For the region with the lowest food inflation, Upper East topped with 18.1%, whilst the Upper West recorded the highest inflation rate of 38.5%.