The country’s inflation rate soared to 3.5 percent in December 2020, bringing the full-year figure to 2.6 percent, as food prices rose amid the seasonal spike in demand due to the holiday season and possibly the spillover effects of typhoons, the Philippine Statistics Authority said yesterday.
In a virtual press briefing, PSA Undersecretary and national statistician Dennis Mapa said that last month’s inflation rate picked up to its highest level since March 2019, mainly brought about by an increase in the prices of food and non-alcoholic beverages, particularly meat, like pork, vegetables, and fish.
“So on meat, we know this is partly on (high) demand and the ASF (African swine fever) where we have a problem on the supply so that one caused the increase…Price of corn in the National Capital Region also rose partly because of the holidays. Hopefully, that would start to go down in January,” he said.
Mapa said the spike last month in the prices of vegetables, particularly garlic, onions, and tomatoes, was possibly due to the spillover effects of typhoons that hit the country in the previous months.
“The celebrations, particularly last Christmas and the New Year pushed the demand for these vegetables to increase and also we have concerns related to the supply…Because of the typhoon, most probably we had supply problems,” he added.
Mapa said the index of vegetables accelerated to 19.7 percent in December 2020 from the previous month’s 14.6 percent.
He also attributed the higher inflation of food and non-alcoholic beverages to the slight increase in rice prices at 0.1 percent in December 2020 after 19 months of negative inflation.
“This is because of the varieties of rice entering the country and the prices, of course, would vary and that caused actually the slight increase in the rice inflation for the NCR,” he said.
The PSA reported that food and non-alcoholic beverages, with inflation of 4.8 percent last month, have a 54-percent share in the overall inflation.
Mapa further said that higher transport costs, particularly tricycle and jeepney fares, were also among the main sources of acceleration of the December 2020 inflation.
He said the NCR registered an inflation of 3.2 percent last month from 3.5 percent in November 2020, while those in areas outside NCR rose to 3.7 percent from 3.3 percent.
The PSA said two regions in areas outside NCR registered the highest inflation – the Region 2 or Cagayan Valley, and Region 5 or Bicol Region. On higher inflation in Cagayan Valley, Mapa said “definitely, this is caused by the typhoons and flooding experienced in that region.”*PNA
