Africa-Press – Malawi. The Reserve Bank of Malawi (RBM) says inflation pressure is expected to persist at the back of rising energy and prices. The central bank has expressed this in its July Market Intelligence Report released Thursday. The report says inflation pressure remains elevated across countries and this is attributed to sustained elevated costs of energy and food items.
The central bank adds that trends in energy and food prices will continue to determine the path for global inflation and that although some commodity prices declined in July 2022, it is likely that they could rise again in the near term, particularly Brent crude oil, as the winter season commences in the Northern Hemisphere.
“Therefore, inflation pressures are expected to persist. It is therefore prudent for monetary policy to remain vigilant and take necessary action to ensure that inflation expectations are well anchored and households’ purchasing power is not eroded,” reads the report.
In July headline inflation went up by 1.1 percentage points to 24.6 from 23.5 percent registered in the preceding month. This was attributed to rising food and non-food inflation which were registered at 32.5 percent and 17.5 percent respectively.
During the same period last year, headline inflation was sailing in single digits, seen at 8.7 percent. The RBM’s Monetary Policy Committee was recently compelled to increase inflation target for 2022 to 23.2 percent from an earlier projection of 12.3 percent.
Justin Mkweu is a fast growing reporter who currently works with Times Group on the business desk. He is however flexible as he also writes about current affairs and national issues.
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