Nigeria’s inflation rate surged to 34.19% in June 2024, up from 33.95% in May, driven by escalating food prices, according to the National Bureau of State Statistics (NBS).
This marks a year-on-year increase of 11.40 percentage points from June 2023, when the rate was 22.79%.
“In June 2024, the headline inflation rate increased to 34.19% relative to the May 2024 headline inflation rate which was 33.95%. Looking at the movement, the June 2024 headline inflation rate showed an increase of 0.24% points when compared to the May 2024 headline inflation rate,” the NBS stated in its Consumer Price Index (CPI) report released on Monday, July 15, 2024.
On a month-on-month basis, the headline inflation rate in June 2024 was 2.31%, 0.17% higher than the rate recorded in May 2024 (2.14%). The NBS noted, “This means that in the month of June 2024, the rate of increase in the average price level is higher than the rate of increase in the average price level in May 2024.”
As expected, there was a rise in food inflation for June 2024 in comparison with the figure recorded in May 2024. “On a month-on-month basis, the Food inflation rate in June 2024 was 2.55% which shows a 0.26% increase compared to the rate recorded in May 2024 (2.28%),” the CPI report read.
According to the NBS, this hike was triggered by a rise in the average prices of food items such as groundnut oil, palm oil, etc (oil & fats class), water yam, cocoyam, cassava, etc (potatoes, yam & other tubers class), tobacco, catfish fresh, croaker, mudfish fresh, snail, etc (fish class).
This inflation spike is putting basic commodities out of reach for millions of Nigerians, exacerbating economic challenges in the country.
