Inflation for May 2024 has dropped significantly to 23.1 per cent, down from 25.0 per cent in April 2024, representing a 1.9 percentage point decrease.
According to the Ghana Statistical Service, the reduction is largely attributed to a decrease in food inflation, which recorded a rate of 22.6 per cent compared to 26.8 per cent in the previous month.
However, non-food inflation saw a slight increase, rising to 23.6 per cent in May 2024 from 23.5 per cent in April 2024. Inflation for locally produced items and imported items also fell, registering rates of 24.7 per cent and 19.6 per cent, respectively.
Speaking to journalists in Accra, Government Statistician Professor Samuel Kobina Annim urged policymakers to focus on transportation, which recorded a month-on-month inflation rate of 10.5%.
He emphasized that transportation costs have a significant impact on overall inflation and should be prioritized over food inflation in policy discussions.
“In this case, what I want the media and policymakers to engage with is not food inflation but transportation, where we are seeing a month-on-month inflation rate of 10.5% when the overall month-on-month rate is 3.2%. We all appreciate how transport costs affect the prices of other items in the inflation basket,” Professor Annim stated.
He added, “The conversation that I really wish will be on the table going forward is how we can ensure that the consistent but slow increases in prices of food at other points will slow down and possibly see reductions in the future.”
