Prices of garri, akpu, others push food inflation to 40%

Nigeria’s headline inflation rose to 33.20 percent, data from the National Bureau of Statistics has shown.

In a report on Monday, the NBS said headline inflation rate, which was 31.70 percent in February, showed an increase of 1.50 percent points.

Also, food inflation increased to 40 percent with prices of garri, akpu, water melon, among others cited as the reason for the increase.

It stated that on a year-on-year basis, the headline inflation rate was 11.16 percent points higher compared to the rate recorded in March 2023, which was 22.04 percent.

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“This shows that the headline inflation rate (year-on-year basis) increased in the month of March 2024 when compared to the same month in the preceding year (i.e. March 2023).”

It added that on a month-on-month basis, the headline inflation rate in March 2024 was 3.02 percent, which was 0.10 percent lower than the rate recorded in February 2024 (3.12 percent).

“This means that in the month of March 2024, the rate of increase in the average price level is less than the rate of increase in the average price level in February 2024,” it said.

The NBS noted that the Food inflation rate in March 2024 was 40.01 percent on a year-on-year basis, which was 15.56 percent points higher compared to the rate recorded in March 2023 (24.45 percent).

“The rise in food inflation on a year-on-year basis was caused by increases in prices of the following items garri, millet, akpu uncooked fermented (which are under the bread and cereals class), yam tuber, water yam (under potatoes, yam, and other tubers class), dried fish sadine, mudfish dried (under fish class), palm oil, vegetable oil (under oil and fat), beef feet, beef head, liver (under meat class), coconut, water melon (under fruit class), lipton tea, Bournvita, Milo (under coffee, tea and cocoa class).

“On a month-on-month basis, the food inflation rate in March 2024 was 3.62 percent which shows a 0.17 percent decrease compared to the rate recorded in February 2024 (3.79 percent).

“The fall in Food inflation on a month-on-month basis was caused by a fall in the rate of increase in the average prices of guinea corn flour, plantain flour etc (under bread and cereals class), yam, Irish Potatoe, Coco Yam (under potatoes, yam & other tubers class), titus fish, mudfish dried (under fish class), Lipton, Bournvita, Ovaltine (under coffee, tea and cocoa class).

“The average annual rate of food inflation for the twelve months ending March 2024 over the previous twelve-month average was 31.40 percent, which was 8.69 percent points increase from the average annual rate of change recorded in March 2023 (22.72 percent),” it added.