Short-term inflation registers largest drop

Food deflation pushes SPI down by 2.81% compared to previous year

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KARACHI:

The Sensitive Price Indicator (SPI) for the week ended April 10, 2025 recorded a historic year-on-year (YoY) decline of 2.81% - the largest annual drop since the SPI data was available. On a week-on-week (WoW) basis, the index fell 0.83%, reflecting a continued reduction in prices of key essential items.

Compared to the previous week, garlic saw a steep drop of 14.73%, followed by tomatoes (12.82%), onions (11.40%), chicken (8.05%), eggs (7.40%), bananas (6.72%), wheat flour (4.74%) and potatoes (2.33%).

Conversely, a few items experienced a price increase during the same period. The most prominent were pulse gram (1.63%), LPG (0.64%), beef and curd (0.59% each), long cloth (0.54%), gur (0.46%), pulse moong (0.35%), salt powder (0.26%), pulse masoor (0.24%), mutton (0.20%) and cigarettes (0.06%).

Out of the 51 items surveyed during the week, prices of 14 items (27.45%) increased, 11 items (21.57%) decreased while prices of 26 items (50.98%) remained unchanged.

On a YoY basis, a significant decrease was observed in prices of onions (71.17%), wheat flour (34.87%), tomatoes (31.07%), chilli powder (20%), garlic (19.79%), Q1 electricity charges (18.92%), Lipton tea (16.98%), eggs (15.04%), pulse mash (13.35%), petrol (11.89%) and diesel (8.29%).

However, notable increases were recorded in prices of ladies' sandals (55.62%), pulse moong (27.55%), powdered milk (25.74%), beef (21.32%), pulse gram (19.83%), sugar (18.77%), 1kg vegetable ghee (16.21%), 2.5kg vegetable ghee (15.66%), cooked daal (12.77%), lawn - printed fabric (12.52%), georgette (10.54%) and firewood (10.53%).

SPI is computed on a weekly basis to assess the price movement of essential commodities at shorter intervals. It comprises 51 essential items, whose data is collected from 50 markets across 17 cities.

According to data compiled by Topline Securities, the SPI for the week ended April 10, 2025 dropped to 317.1 points, reflecting a WoW decrease of 0.83% and YoY decline of 2.81% - the sharpest YoY decline on record.