April inflation: food prices up 3% in Georgia

Fruit, vegetables, fish, bread, meat, oil and other food products cost 3 per cent higher in April 2020 than a month ago, according to the latest inflation data from the National Statistics Office of Georgia (Geostat).

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In April 2020 the prices of food and non-alcoholic beverages increased by 3 per cent. The prices in the group increased for the subgroups of:

• Fruit and grapes (17.7%)
• Vegetables (7.1%)
• Fish (6.2%)
• Coffee, tea and cocoa (4.4%)
• Sugar, jam, honey, chocolate and confectionery (3%)
• Bread and cereals (1.6%)
• Meat (1.2%)
• Oils and fats (0.9%)

Meanwhile, prices decreased for milk, cheese and eggs (-0.3%), said Geostat.

Year-on-year food prices increased by 16.1 per cent. The prices were higher for:

• Fruit and grapes (45.4%)
• Milk, cheese and eggs (23.2%)
• Sugar, jam, honey, chocolate and confectionery (16.9%)
• Meat (15%)
• Fish (14.9%)
• Vegetables (14.1%)
• Oils and fats (11%)
• Mineral waters, soft drinks, fruit and vegetable juices (10%)
• Coffee, tea and cocoa (10%)
• Bread and cereals (8.4%)

Prices of transport went down 3 per cent. The prices decreased for operation of personal transport equipment (-3.8%).

Overall in April 2020, the consumer price index increased by 0.9 per cent compared to the previous month, while the annual inflation rate amounted to 6.9 per cent.

With regard to te annual core inflation (core inflation is calculated by excluding the following groups of goods and services from the consumer basket: food and non-alcoholic beverages, energy, regulated tariffs, transport ), the prices increased by 4.6 per cent, while the annual core inflation without tobacco amounted to 4.1 per cent, said Geostat.

Geostat explained that to calculate the inflation rate, prices were collected on the dates between the 10th and 20th of each month in about 1,800 retail outlets in six major cities: Tbilisi, Kutaisi, Batumi, Gori, Telavi and Zugdidi.

Geostat said that the COVID-19 pandemic has had an impact on the price collection process.

"Some retail outlets were not functioning, which made it impossible to register certain prices. Out of 1,800 outlets 1,150 had canceled all operations and as a result, only up to 40 per cent of the total amount of price database was registered", said Geostat.