Expensive tomatoes, pork push January inflation to 2.9%

Expensive tomatoes and pork pushed the rate of increase in prices of basic goods and services to 2.9 percent in January, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) reported on Wednesday, Jan. 5.

Last month's headline inflation matched the same rate as December 2024 but inched up from 2.8 percent in January 2024.

January's outturn was still within the government's two- to four-percent target range of manageable year-on-year price hikes deemed conducive to economic growth.

National Statistician Claire Dennis S. Mapa told a press briefing that the top contributors to the inflation uptick were food items, especially tomatoes, pork, poultry meat, and fish like galunggong.

Dining out in restaurants and rental fees were also more expensive last month than a year ago, Mapa said.

These offset the deflation, or 2.3-percent year-on-year decline, in rice prices in January, he added.

Economists expect downward inflation in 2025, from 2024's 3.2 percent, to allow the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) to lower borrowing rates and bolster the domestic economy, which has been reeling from below-target growth rates over the past two years due to strong typhoons last year and elevated consumer prices in the previous year. The average inflation of six percent in 2023 was the highest annual rate since the 2008 global financial crisis.

BSP Governor Eli M. Remolona Jr. signaled over the weekend a total of 50-basis point (bp) cut in the policy rate this year, or 25 bps per semester.