Dissecting Data: Inflation steady in April, but transport and meat costs still threats

There are troubling trends that will present challenges to consumers in the coming months.

MANILA - Inflation has steadied, with the headline number remaining at 4.5 percent, same as March. However, there are troubling trends that will present challenges to consumers in the coming months.

Undersecretary Dennis Mapa of the Philippine Statistic Authority attributed rising transportation inflation to higher prices of fossil fuels. He noted that this also bled into other household expenses. The food inflation chart above compares rice, meat, fish and vegetables. Rice, shown in blue, and vegetable inflation, shown in green, were negative in April. Fish inflation in gray reflected a slight uptick in spite of lower prices of tilapia and bangus. Meat prices remained very high compared to the other items.

“Demand has suffered due to the tighter mobility restrictions, causing prices to moderate. Also, it's summertime and harvest season for certain vegetables and fruits. I doubt if the mushrooming of community pantries is the reason for a general decline in vegetable prices.”“I don’t know whether this is due to additional supply, low demand, impact of community pantries,” Mapa said.

“The timely approval of the temporary cut in pork import tariffs is seen to help address supply constraints and ease price pressures going forward. In addition, inflation expectations remain well anchored to the inflation target over the policy horizon.” In the chart above, inflation is broken down by commodity groups, with April 2021 shown by the darkest blue bars. Restaurant or prepared meals were also a significant contributor to inflation, alongside housing expenses such as LPG.

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