Colombo inflation decelerates to 2.8-pct in December

Jan 01, 2016 (LBO) – Consumer prices in Sri Lanka’s capital Colombo rose 2.8 percent in December 2015 from a year earlier, down from 3.1 percent in November 2015 with the inflation index rising 0.3 percent in the month, the state statistics office said. The Consumer price index for all items in December was 185.2 compared to November for which the index was 184.7. This increase represents an expenditure value of 137 rupees in the goods basket. For the month of December 2015, on year to year basis, contribution to inflation by food commodities was 1.99 percent. Year on year inflation of Food Group has decreased from 5.2 percent in November to 4.2 percent in December 2015 while Non‐food Group increased by 1.1 percent to 1.5 percent during this period. Contribution of Non food items was 0.77 percent. This was mainly due to value change increases in Clothing and Footwear (0.57%), Health (0.79%) and Education (0.24%) groups while value change decreases of Housing, Water, Electricity, Gas and Other Fuels and Transport groups. The amount of decrease in ‘Housing, Water, Electricity, Gas & Other Fuels’ has been mainly due to the price decline of L.P. Gas (0.72%) and Kerosene Oil (0.17%). Also the amount of decrease in ‘Transport’ has been mainly due to the price decline of Bus fare (0.21%) and Petrol and Diesel (0.86%). The net effect of above items has led to the increase in Non‐food sub index.