Producer Price Index up 0.5 per cent in July

The year-on-year inflation from the Producer Price Index (PPI) for all industry increased slightly from 8.2 per cent in July 2018 to 7.7 per cent in 2017.

The rate shows a 0.5 percentage point increase in producer inflation relative to the rate recorded in June 2018.

The month-on-month change in the producer price index between June 2018 and July 2018 was -0.2 per cent, Mr Baah Wadieh, the Acting Government Statistician, announced this at a press conference in Accra on Wednesday.

Wadieh explained that the increase in the rate was mainly due to Mining and Quarrying sub-sector, which increased by 1.7 percentage point over the June 2018 rate of 5.8 per cent to record 7.5 per cent in July 2018.

He stated that the producer inflation for manufacturing, which constituted more than two-thirds of total industry increased by 0.2 percentage points to record 10.4 per cent.

Wadieh said the utilities in July 2018 recorded inflation of -0.2 percent in July 2018, indicating an increase of 0.2 percentage point, relative to the rate recorded in June 2018.

Wadieh stated that, the manufacturing sub-sector recorded the highest year-on-year producer price inflation rate of 10.4 per cent, followed by the mining and quarrying sub-sector with 7.5 per cent.

The utilities sub-sector recorded the lowest year-on-year producer inflation of -0.2 per cent.

Touching on the monthly changes, Mr Wadieh said the Mining and quarrying sector recorded the highest inflation rate of 0.5 per cent, while the manufacturing and the Utilities sub-sectors recorded 0.2 per cent.