Ministry of Development Planning and Statistics (MDPS) has released the Monthly Producer Price Index (PPI) of the industrial sector for July 2018 with the base year 2013. Producer price index covers goods relating to "Mining" (weight: 72.7 percent), "Manufacturing" (weight: 26.8 percent), and "Electricity & Water" (weight: 0.5 percent).
The Overall PPI for July, 2018 is estimated at 70.3 points showing a decrease by 0.1 percent, when compared to the previous month's June 2018. On Y-o-Y basis, PPI of July, 2018 showed a rise of 37.6 percent when compared to the PPI of July 2017.With regard to Mining, the PPI of July, 2018 showed no change when compared with PPI of April 2017, primarily due to the stability of "Crude petroleum and natural gas" prices. PPI of July 2018. When compared with its counterpart in previous year (July 2017), there has been a considerable increase of 43.6 percent.
Meanwhile, in Manufacturing, a decrease of 0.1 percent has been recorded in July, 2018, when compared with the previous month's Manufacturing index (June,2018). The prices decrease are seen in: "Basic Chemicals" by 2.3 percent, "juices" by 2.1 percent, "Dairy products" by 0.4 percent, "Cement and Other non-metallic products" by 0.2 percent.
However, the increasing prices are noticed in "Basic Metals" by 1.9 percent, "Grain mill and Other products", and "Rubber and Plastics products" by 1.0 percent each, "Refined Petroleum products" by 0.3 percent, and "Beverages" by 0.1 percent. No change noticed in "Paper and Paper products " and "Other chemical products and fibers".
Comparing with the index of counterpart in the previous year (July 2017), "Manufacturing" PPI of July, 2018 showed a rise of 27.3 percent. The major groups which explain this price increase are
"Refined Petroleum products" by 37.6 percent, followed by "Basic Metals" by 16.8 percent, "Basic chemicals" by 13.8 percent, "Dairy products" by 12.2 percent, "Paper and Paper Products" by 11.3 percent, "Other chemical products and fibers" by 10.9 percent, and "Rubber and Plastics products" by 3.5 percent, and "Grain mill and Other products" by 0.7 percent.
However, prices fall also noticed in "Cement and Other non-metallic products" by 4.2 percent, "Beverages" by 2.7 percent, and" Juices" by 1.1 percent.
In the Electricity and Water sector, the PPI of July showed an increase of 0.8 percent compared to June 2018, resulting from an increasing price in "Water" by 3.8 percent, and a decreasing in "Electricity" by 2.1 percent. When compared the PPI of July, 2018, to the PPI of July, 2017 Y-o-Y, showed an increase of 3.3 percent, affected by prices rise in "Electricity" by 6.1 percent, and "Water" by 0.5 percent.
