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Consumer prices edge up last month

Consumer prices rose slightly last month from the year previous, due to rising costs of vegetables, seafood and service charges prior to the Lunar New Year holidays, as well as sustained high materials costs, the Directorate General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday.

The consumer price index (CPI), a closely-watched indicator gauging inflation, rose 1.94 percent year-on-year to 101.65 points last month, after climbing 0.50 percent in January.

Seasonally adjusted, the figure was down 0.09 percent from January, DGBAS said in a statement released yesterday.

Core consumer prices, which exclude food and energy costs, rose 1.87 percent from a year earlier last month after sliding 0.3 percent in January, according to the statement.

The DGBAS forecast the CPI to rise 1.7 percent this year, after climbing 1.62 percent in last year.

But the CPI may go even higher if global crude oil prices continue to surge, which will prompt the nation's oil refiners to hike domestic pump prices.

Chinese Petroleum Corp (中油), the nation's largest refiner, may raise oil prices this week, according to a report in a Chinese-language newspaper yesterday, which didn't cite a source for the information.

The CPI is estimated to increase 0.4 percent if oil prices rise by 10 percent, according to the DGBAS.
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