The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) has revealed that Nigeria’s inflation rate climbed to N22.41% in May 2023, up from 22.22% in April.
Similarly, the Urban inflation rate soared to 23.74% last month, up from 18.24% reported in May last year. This indicates a 5.50 points year-on-year increase.
According to the NBS, in its inflation report, ‘Consumer Price Index (CPI)’, the Rural inflation rate for May 2023 was 21.19%, in contrast with the 17.21% posted during the corresponding period in 2022.
Prime Business Africa learnt that inflation was driven in May 2023 by Food & Non-Alcoholic Beverages, Housing Water, Electricity, Gas & Other Fuel and Clothing & Footwear, amongst others.
The CPI report stated: “In May 2023, the headline inflation rate increased to 22.41% relative to April 2023 headline inflation rate which was 22.22%. Looking at the movement, the May 2023 inflation rate showed an increase of 0.19% points when compared to April 2023 headline inflation rate.
“Similarly, on a year-on-year basis, the headline inflation rate was 4.70% points higher compared to the rate recorded in May 2022, which was (17.71%).
“This shows that the headline inflation rate (year-on-year basis) increased in the month of May 2023 when compared to the same month in the preceding year (i.e., May 2022).”
Oil and fat, Yam and other tubers, Bread and cereals, Fish, Potatoes, Fruits, Meat, Vegetable, as well as Spirit pushed Food inflation to 24.82% in May 2023, which is above the 19.50% rate reported during the same period last year.
The NBS explained that: “The rise in the food inflation on year-on-year basis was caused by increases in prices of Oil and fat, Yam and other tubers, Bread and cereals, Fish, Potatoes, Fruits, Meat, Vegetable, Spirit. On a month-on-month basis, the Food inflation rate in May 2023 was 2.19%, this was 0.06% higher compared to the rate recorded in April 2023 (2.13%).
“The average annual rate of Food inflation for the twelve-months ending May 2023 over the previous twelvemonth average was 23.65%, which was 4.97 % points increase from the average annual rate of change recorded in May 2022 (18.68%).”
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