National consumer prices down 0.7% in January

Sri Lanka’s national inflation measured by National Consumer Price Index (NCPI) has slowed down to -0.7 percent on year-on-year basis mainly due to the higher base of the corresponding period in 2015.
 
This was against 4.2 percent inflation rate recorded in December 2015, slowing down from 4.8 percent in November. 

The NCPI for all items for the month of January 2015 was 112. 

A decrease of 1.2 index points or a percentage of 1.1 was noted in January 2016 compared to December 2015 for which the index was 113.2. 

This monthly decrease was mainly due to the decrease in prices of the items in the food and non alcoholic beverages categories.

This decrease represents an expenditure value of Rs. 379.66 in the “market basket”.

The moving average inflation rate for the month of January 2016 is 2.9 percent. 

The DCS says the NCPI is compiled using prices collected from all the nine provinces. 

The Colombo Consumer Price Index (CCPI) only covers the urban areas of the Colombo district.  

The NCPI (base year 2013), is based on data from the Household Income and Expenditure Survey (HIES) conducted in 2012/13.