INFLATION rate in the Cordillera Administrative Region for the month of April slowed down to 2.6% from the 3.3% in April 2018 according to the Philippine Statistics Authority.
PSA-CAR added by food items, only fish recorded the highest price increase both in 2018 and 2019 while prices of rice went down to negative 5.2% last month.
Apayao province had the highest inflation rate at 6%, followed by Ifugao at 5.9%, and Abra at 4.5%.
PSA-Cordillera said inflation surpassed the April 2018 rate for the provinces of Abra, Apayao, and Ifugao while other provinces had lower inflation rates in April 2019 relative to the same month last year.
For commodity group, alcoholic beverages and tobacco had the highest inflation among other commodities in the region with 17%, followed by health with 7.8%.
Meanwhile, purchasing power of peso in the region has dropped to 85 centavos.
“It dropped by two centavos from 87 centavos in April 2018. This means that one peso in 2012 is worth 85 centavos in April 2019,” PSA said.
The data arm agency added a basket of goods that can be bought with 100 pesos in December 2012 is worth 117.4 pesos in April 2019.
Moreover, the Purchasing Power of Peso (PPP) in all the provinces weakened in April 2019 compared to the same month of the previous year.
Mountain Province had the highest peso value at 88 centavos while, Apayao and Kalinga both had the lowest peso value at 82 centavos.
Inflation is the rate of change in the average price level between two periods (year-on year/month-on-month as measured by the Consumer Price Index (CPI) which the general measure of the change in the average retail prices of a market basket or collection of goods and services commonly purchased by the average Filipino household.
“In general, the CPI increased reflecting the rise in the average prices of goods and services in all the six provinces of CAR.”