Fortune News | Dec 28,2019
Headline inflation, an indicator of the cost of living, stagnated at 10.9pc last month, according to the latest report from the Central Statistical Agency (CSA).
Last month's Consumer Price Index (CPI), which quantifies the price of a basket of goods and services, states that the rate had shown the same growth as the preceding month, January.
The report indicates that the food inflation rate in the stated period reached 10.7pc, a 0.8 percentage point decline from the previous month.
"Prices of wheat, rice, barley and sorghum have shown slight declines," reads the report, "on the other hand the price of fruit, meat, milk, cheese, eggs, butter, spices, Teffand maize increased last month."
In February non-food inflation has shown a percentage point increase that reached 11.2pc. The rate was pushed by the price increases in narcotics and stimulants, especially khat, clothing, footwear, house rent, housing repair and maintenance, energy and automobiles.
A mini-market assessment conducted by Fortune revealed that the price of automobiles, especially Toyota Vitz models, has shown an average a 12pc price increase.
While the inflationary pressure in Ethiopia has remained in double digits, Kenya managed to keep the rate in the single digits at 4.14pc. Kenya's inflation rate in February has shown a 0.6 percentage point decline from the preceding month, according to tradingeconomics.com,a New York-based statistics and data provider.
Though the rate stayed in the double digits for the past three months, the government has only managed to bring the rate down to the single digits, 9.3pc, in November of last year, but it jumped into double-digit territory the following month. Yet the rate is still lower than last fiscal year's average rate of 14.4pc.
Getachew Asfaw, an economist who has published several books on the macroeconomic conditions of the country, attributes the lessening of inflationary pressures on the current economy to a fall in demand.
"The construction industry has gone slow in recent months," said Getachew, who served in the former Northern Ethiopia Regional Planning Office, the former Ministry of Planning & Economic Development and later the Ministry of Finance & Economic Development (MoFED).
Last month's address by the Prime Minister to the parliament affirms the expert's assertion.
"We have targeted to control the inflation rate by cutting government expenditures and investments in mega projects," Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed (PhD) told the members of parliament last month.
The expert fears that the government's policy on measures to control the inflation rate could negatively affect the unemployment rate as the two need opposite policy measures.
"When the government stops investing in mega projects and the construction industry," said Getachew, "the number of unemployed in the country increases."
Better control for the rate hike that Getachew recommends is that the government balance the two opposite policies.
"Controlling the inflationary pressure while keeping unemployment lower is the basic thing that needs to be achieved," he concluded.
Last month's report by the Agency is the third since it revised the base year for inflation rate measurements that quantify the price of a basket of goods and services. The revision was made eight years after the previous update.
PUBLISHED ON
Mar 09,2019 [ VOL
19 , NO
984]
Fortune News | Dec 28,2019
Radar | Apr 13,2019
Life Matters | Jun 13,2020
Fortune News | Jan 05,2020
Digital First | Mar 17,2020
Featured | Sep 28,2019
Commentaries | Sep 10,2021
Viewpoints | Jun 05,2021
Fortune News | Oct 23,2021
November 27 , 2021
Against my will, I have witnessed the most terrible defeat of reason and the most sa...
November 13 , 2021
Plans and reality do not always gel. They rarely do in a fast-moving world. Every act...
October 16 , 2021 . By HAWI DADHI
Residing in a country with no capital market, an organised marketplace for trading se...
August 28 , 2021 . By HAWI DADHI
The streets of Addis Abeba are as varied as they are many, although too many of them have yet to be named. From the narrow alleyways of the...
January 15 , 2022
Foes and friends of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed (PhD) agree that his administration is...
January 7 , 2022
There has not been much research to put a number on high costs wars inflict on Africa...
January 1 , 2022
It is a norm to emphasise grand structural changes to address the myriad political pr...
December 25 , 2021
In the words of Herbert Hoover, the 31st president of the United States, it is older...
Put your comments here