The national year-on-year inflation rate for January 2022 has increased to 13.9%, which is 1.3 percentage points higher than the 12.6% recorded in December 2021.
Professor Samuel Kobina Anim, the Government Statistician who announced this explained, that this is the highest figure recorded since the rebasing of the economy was done in August 2019.
Month-on-month inflation between December 2021 and January 2022 was 2.1%.
“For the first time in seven months, non-food inflation on a year-on-year basis outstrips food inflation with the main drivers, being Housing, Water, Electricity, Gas and other Fuels.”
In a statement, the GSS said two divisions, (Housing, Water, Electricity, Gas and Other Fuels, and Transport) recorded inflation rates above the national average of 13.9% with Housing, Water, Electricity, Gas and other Fuels (28.7%) recording the highest inflation.
Regional Inflation
At the regional level, the overall year-on-year inflation ranged from 6.9% in the Eastern Region to 18.4% in the Greater Accra Region.
Greater Accra Region recorded the highest month-on-month inflation of 5.0%.
Meanwhile, the Upper West region recorded a negative month-on-month inflation rate in January 2022 (-1.0%).
Food and Non-Food Inflation
This month’s food inflation (13.7%) is higher than both last month food inflation (12.8%) and the average of the previous 12 months (10.4%).
According to the GSS, food inflation’s contribution to total inflation decreased marginally from 45.2% in December 2021 to 44.2% in January 2022. Whiles overall month-on-month food inflation was 2.0%, which is higher than the twelve-month national month-on-month rolling average of food inflation (1.1%).
The report pointed out that “14 out of the 15 food subclasses recorded positive month-on-month inflation with fruit and vegetable juices recording a deflation (-0.4%).
…Non-food year-on-year inflation on average went up again in January 2022 compared to December 2021 (from 12.5% to 14.1%).”
The Ghana Statistical Service noted that two out of the 12 Non-food Divisions had the 12 month rolling average to be higher than the year-on-year inflation for January 2022 for the divisions.
Imported and Local Inflation
The report further indicated that the inflation for imported goods was 11.0% (which is higher than the 10.4% recorded for December 2021) while the inflation for locally produced items was 15.0% (up from the 13.3% recorded in December 2021).
Nicholas Brown
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