Rice, among other food products, mainly drive Aklan’s inflation faster in August 2023

Aklan’s headline inflation grew faster at 4.5 percent in August 2023 from 3.5 percent in July 2023.

This is attributed to rapid increase of price indices of most Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages from 7.2 percent to 10.6 percent in a month.

Rice largely contributed to the increase of Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverage commodity group that reached 11.0 percent this month from 6.3 percent in July.

Fruit-bearing vegetables followed, hitting 49.3 percent inflation from 8.8 percent in the past month.

Moreover, prices of meat increased to 3.5 percent from -2.0 percent, leafy or stem vegetables increased to 16.8 percent from 5.2 percent, and Dates, figs, and tropical fruits increased to 3.8 percent from -0.4 percent, all in a month’s period from July to August 2023.

Other major commodity groups which caused the inflation uptrend were Transport at 2.0 percent, Alcoholic beverages and tobacco at 9.0 percent, and Recreation, sport and culture at 2.1 percent.

Aklan ranked second next to Iloilo among the highest contributing province to uptrend of Western Visayas’ inflation level at 5.2 percent from 4.4 percent in the past month.

Furthermore, this report revealed that an individual needed P1,197.00 in August 2023 in order to buy the same 1000-peso worth of goods and services bought in 2018.

Interpreted in another way, the real value of a 100-peso bill in 2018 is only worth Php83.54 in August 2023 due to inflation.