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| Eastern Visayas ended 2021 with a 3.4 percent Inflation Rate (IR). This IR is 0.4 percentage point lower than the 3.8 percentage point IR in November 2021. PHOTO: PSA RSSO 8 |
TACLOBAN CITY — Eastern Visayas ended 2021 with an inflation rate (IR) of 3.4 percent in December. This IR is 0.4 percent lower than the November 2021 IR of 3.8 percent. However, the region's December 2021 IR is 1.0 percent higher than the 2.4 percent recorded in the same period last year. Compared to the national average IR, the regional IR is 0.2 percent lower in December 2021 than the national IR of 3.6 percent.
Eastern Samar had the highest IR in the provinces, at 4.4 percent in December 2021. Biliran's IR was 4.2 percent, followed by Samar's at 3.7 percent. Southern Leyte had the lowest IR at 2.2 percent. In December 2021, all provinces had lower IRs than in November 2021.
Additionally, Samar's IR fell by 1.7 percentage points, from 5.4 percent a month ago to 3.7 percent in December 2021. Southern Leyte's IR grew at a slower pace of 2.2 percent in December 2021, 1.2 percent points slower than November 2021's 3.4 percent IR. On the other hand, Northern Samar saw a 1.0 percentage point decline, lowering its December 2021 inflation rate to 3.0%.
Meanwhile, the inflation rate in Leyte, Biliran, and Eastern Samar all decreased by 0.1 percentage point in December 2021, settling at 3.0%, 4.20%, and 4.40%, respectively. In December 2021, only the commodity groups housing, water, electricity, gas, and other fuels; furnishings, household equipment, and routine housekeeping; and restaurant and miscellaneous goods and services registered IRs that were 0.3 percentage point, 0.1 percentage point, and 0.1 percentage point higher than the previous month's levels, respectively. The IRs for all other commodity groups have either decreased or remained unchanged in November.
On the other hand, the transport commodity group recorded the highest IR of 6.7 percent during the month under review, followed by housing, water, electricity, gas, and other fuels at 6.2 percent. All other commodity groups have IRs lower than the 3.4 percent IR for all items.
With a decrease of 2.8 percent in IR, the alcoholic beverages and tobacco commodity group fell to 2.3 percent in December 2021 from 5.1 percent in November 2021. This can be seen in the IR declines of 1.0 percentage point and 3.9 percentage points in the tobacco and alcoholic beverage indices, respectively. In the transport commodity group, IR decreased from 8.7% in November 2021 to 6.7 percent in December 2021. This 2.0 percent decline in IR was facilitated by a 9.7 percent decline in the double-digit IR in personal transport equipment index operation.
In December 2021, the IR for the food and non-alcoholic beverages commodity group decreased to 3.3 percent from 4.0 percent in November 2021. Vegetables' IR decreased to 1.0 percent in December 2021 from 5.0 percent in November 2021, a decrease of 4.0 percentage points. The IR for fish decreased to 9.7 percent in December 2021 from 12.4 percent a month earlier.
Additionally, slower IRs were observed in the indices of food products not classified elsewhere: oils and fats (1.4 percent); sugar, jam, honey, chocolate, and confectionery (1.1 percent); and milk, cheese, and eggs (1.1 percent) (0.7 percent ).
Rice and corn indexes continued to deflate, albeit at a slower pace of 1.5 percent and 1.4 percent, respectively. The index of non-alcoholic beverages maintained its IR of 0.2 percent from the previous month, while bread and cereals maintained its deflation of 1.2 percent from the previous month. On the other hand, the meat index maintained a double-digit IR of 14.4% in December 2021. Fruit prices also increased during the month under review, posting an IR of 6.1 percent.
In December 2021, the IR for the clothing and footwear commodity group (1.4 percent) decreased by 0.2 percentage point from November 2021 levels. Similarly, the IR for the health commodity group decreased by 0.1 percentage point to 0.9 percent in December 2021. On the other hand, the IR for the commodity group housing, water, electricity, gas, and other fuels increased to 6.2 percent in December 2021 from 5.9 percent in November 2021, a slight increase of 0.3 percentage point.
The electricity, gas prompted this increase in IR, and other fuels index's higher double-digit IR of 17.9 percent. In December 2021, the IRs for restaurant and miscellaneous goods and services and furnishings, household equipment, and routine maintenance of the house both increased by 0.1 percentage point to 1.1 percent and 0.6 percent, respectively.
Meanwhile, the commodity group of recreation and culture; communication; and education maintained their respective IRs of 0.9 percent, 0.7 percent, and 0.1 percent from the previous month. In December 2021, the region's Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) remained at P0.75. According to this PPP, goods, and services worth P75.00 in 2012 will be worth P100.00 in December 2021. PPP in Biliran and Northern Samar both decreased by P0.01 when compared to November 2021 levels.
The remaining provinces retained their PPP from the previous month. Biliran and Leyte had the highest PPPs at P0.78, while Samar had the lowest at P0.69. (Source: GTT with reports from PSA RSSO 8/PRESS RELEASE)