By RBJ
Inflation in August was at a level of 13.3%, compared to the EU average of 10.1%. This annualized inflation rate is much lower than the one reported four days ago by the National Institute of Statistics (INS). On September 12, “the annual inflation rate rose to 15.3% in August, from 14.96% in July”, data from the National Institute of Statistics showed.
Something is happening at the Romanian statistical institution. The lack of reliability of statistical data is a very serious fact for our country. Perhaps the Romanian Government should analyze what is happening inside this institution so important for a good knowledge of the state of the economy and other sectors of social life.
We return to Eurostat, which shows that the annual inflation rate in the euro area reached, in August, a new record level of 9.1% (up from 8.9% the previous month), while in the European Union (EU) rose from 9.8% to 10.1%. The member countries with the highest inflation rates were Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Poland, the Netherlands, Slovakia and Romania, according to the data published on Friday by the European Statistics Office (Eurostat).
Compared to the situation in July, the annual inflation rate decreased in 12 member states, and increased in another 15. In Romania, the annual inflation rate rose to 13.3% in August, from 13% in July. Last year, in the same month, the annual inflation rate in Romania was 4%. The highest annual inflation rates in the EU were recorded last month in Estonia (25.2%), Latvia (21.4%), Lithuania (21.1%), Hungary (18.6%), the Czech Republic (17.1%), Bulgaria (15%), Poland (14.8%), the Netherlands (13.7%), Slovakia (13.4%) and Romania (13.3%). At the opposite pole, the EU member countries with the lowest inflation are France (6.6%), Malta (7%) and Finland (7.9%).
For the eurozone countries, the most significant impact on the annual price increase came from energy, where an increase of 3.95 percentage points (pp) was recorded, followed by food, alcohol and tobacco prices, which increased by 2.25 pp, services (1.62 pp) and the prices of non-energy industrial goods, which registered an advance of 1.33 pp.
Also, Eurostat data shows that in the euro area core inflation, i.e. what remains after the prices of volatile goods such as energy and food are removed, increased from 5.1% to 5.5%. Core inflation is the indicator closely followed by the European Central Bank (ECB) when elaborating its monetary policy decisions.