Ghana’s Inflation rises to 43.1%

 

Food costs drive Ghana's headline inflation up to 43.1%.

Due to rising food prices, Ghana's inflation rate rose to 43.1% in July, the highest level in four months. This puts additional pressure on the central bank to keep hiking interest rates in the coming month. 

Samuel Kobina Annim, the government statistician, disclosed that the annual inflation rate increased from 42.5% in June to 43.1%.

This was higher than the median projection of 42% offered by five analysts in a Bloomberg survey, marking the highest level since March. 

Annim pointed out that increased food prices were the main cause of the inflationary spike.  

Inflation for food increased from 54.2% to 55% in the preceding month, and for non-food items it increased from 33.4% to 33.8%. Overall, prices rose by 3.6% during the past year.

Remember that the monetary policy committee of Ghana recently raised the nation's benchmark interest rate by 50 basis points to 30%, citing the fact that price pressures were not subsiding quickly enough.

Since November 2021, this has caused the cumulative rate to rise to 16.5% points. 

According to experts, policymakers may feel inclined to execute another interest rate increase during their meeting scheduled for September 18–22 if this higher trend in inflation persists. 

At 11:04 a.m. in Accra, the Ghanaian cedi was trading essentially unchanged at 11.1646 to the dollar. According to Bloomberg generic pricing, the nation's dollar bond due in 2032 increased 0.2 cents to 45.1 cents on the dollar.