The Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) says inflation rate for August 2020 dropped to 10.5% because of a marginal drop in food inflation.
The month-on-month decline, to the lowest rate since April 2020, was by 0.4 percentage points.
Speaking at a press conference on Wednesday, the government statistician Professor Samuel Annim, said: “Total month-on-month inflation is negative because it is pulled down by negative food inflation (-1.1%) and negative inflation for the recreation, sport and culture division (-1.4%).
Food drove the rate
“The monthly change rate for August stood in contrast to the average 0.9% month-on-month inflation that was recorded during April to July 2020 and the average month-on-month inflation rate of 0.7% that was recorded in the six months before COVID-19,” he said.
Food and non-alcoholic beverages recorded year-on-year inflation of 11.4% for August, representing a 2.3-point drop from the 13.7% recorded in July 2020.
Two subgroups recorded inflation higher than the group’s average rate of 13.7%: vegetables (21.3%) and fish/other seafood (14.3%).
This signals that food was the predominant driver of year-on-year inflation in August. Non-food items recorded year-on-year inflation of 9.9% in August.
Non-food inflation for August was 0.2 percentage points higher than the 9.7% recorded for July 2020.
Regional variations on a theme
Inflation for imported goods was 4.8%, while the average rate for locally produced goods was 12.6%.
Month-on-month inflation for imported goods was 0%, while month-on-month inflation for local goods was -0.8%.
At the regional level, year-on-year inflation ranged from below 5% in Volta to 13.5% in Greater Accra.
Also recording inflation rates above the national average of 10.5% were Ashanti (11.2%), the Western Region (11.6%) and the Eastern Region (11.9%). Volta Region had the lowest year-on-year inflation rate – 4.7%.
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