THE Department of Finance (DOF) sees inflation settling at 6.3 percent for the month of November, with the prices of food commodities seen decreasing specifically for rice and vegetables.
The 6.3 percent is lower than the inflation rate reported in October of 6.7 percent and higher than the 3.3 percent recorded in November 2017.
Finance Undersecretary Gil S. Beltran told reporters, “We expect that it will go down [for November]…. So the year-on-year will be around 6.2 percent, from the 6.7 percent right now. Prices on average are almost not moving.”
The DOF sees a reduction in the prices of rice and vegetables for the month, but meat prices may rise as the Christmas month advances.
“Rice prices have gone down; also the vegetables, but the meat has increased because it’s Christmas time; it will go up,” he added.
The Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) reported last month that the country’s inflation level for October remained unchanged at 6.7 percent coming from the same figure in September this year.
Prices of commodities for October posted slight changes, with food and nonalcoholic beverages settling at 9.4 percent, and alcoholic beverages and tobacco prices posting a minimal decrease at 21.6 percent.
The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) earlier reported that it sees inflation for the year to average around 2 to 4 percent.
Earlier, the Duterte administration’s economic managers recommended to the President a number of nontariff measures to rein in the rising inflation levels of the country brought about by supply-side constraints.