Eastern Visayas’ inflation rate up by 5.8% in May

By PSA-8
June 18, 2018

TACLOBAN CITY – The annual Inflation Rate (IR) of Eastern Visayas went up by 5.8% in May 2018. This IR was 0.4 percentage point higher compared with the 5.4 percent IR a month ago, and 2.2 percentage points higher than the recorded 3.6 percent IR in the same period last year. The regional inflation rate was 1.2 percentage points higher than the 4.6 percent national average in May.

Four provinces in the region – Biliran, Leyte, Samar and Southern Leyte posted higher inflation rates in May with 1.2 percentage points, 0.1 percentage point, 0.5 percentage point, and 0.6 percentage point increases, respectively, compared with their figures in the previous month. On the other hand, Eastern Samar and Northern Samar registered 0.3 percentage point and 0.1 percentage point decreases in IR, respectively. Samar registered the highest IR at 7.5 percent, while Southern Leyte posted the lowest IR at 1.3 percent (Table 1).

By major commodity groups, Housing, Water, Electricity, Gas and Other Fuels posted the highest percent change in IR at 1.0 percentage point from April to May. Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages followed at 0.4 percentage point.

Annual price changes in Transport, Alcoholic Beverages and Tobacco, Health and Education decreased from 3.6% in April to 3.5% in May.

Communication recorded zero inflation rate during the reference month, while Restaurant and Miscellaneous Goods and Services retained its previous month’s rate of 1.6%.

The Purchasing Power of Peso (PPP) of the region was recorded at P0.81 in May 2018. This is weaker compared with the P0.82 PPP registered in the previous month. This PPP implies that goods and services worth 100 pesos in May 2018 only costs 81 pesos in 2012.

Biliran and Samar registered a 0.01 centavo decrease in the PPP compared with their figures in April. The rest of the provinces had sustained their PPP from last month. Leyte and Southern Leyte recorded the strongest PPP at P0.84. Biliran ranked second at P0.81, followed by Eastern Samar at P0.80 and Northern Samar at P0.77. Samar, meanwhile, posted the weakest PPP at P0.76. (Table 1).