Inflation increase in November 2015

In a communique issued on NCPI, Dr. Amara Satharasinghe Director General of Census and Statistics said that Year on Year inflation based on NCPI for the month of November 2015 was calculated as 4.8% and inflation calculated for October 2015 was 3.0%.

NCPI has been estimated as 112.0 for November 2015. This shows an increase of 2.8 index points and also a percentage of 2.6 compared to the previous month’s (October) index of 109.2. This change is due to the increases of food items by 2.1% and increases of non-food items by 0.5% respectively.

The increase of food items was mainly due to the price increases in Vegetables, Green chilies, Rice, Big Onions, Potatoes, Coconuts, Limes, Red Onions, Fresh fish and dried chilies. However, slight price decreases were recorded for Mangoes, Papaw, Chicken, Eggs, Sprats-dry and Banana.

The non-food commodity groups have increased by 0.5 percent in November 2015 compared to October 2015. This was mainly due to the increase in non-food commodity groups of ‘Transport’ and ‘Miscellaneous Goods and Services’. A decrease was reported for ‘Housing, Water, Electricity, Gas and Other Fuels’ group and it has mainly been due to the decline of price of L.P Gas.

The latest Consumer Price Index (CPI) released by the DCS is National Consumer Price Index (NCPI). DCS commenced releasing National Consumer Price Index (Base 2013=100) from October 2015 with a time lag of 21 days.