Marginal drop attributable to lower cost of foodstuffs
Tomatoes recorded the steepest price drop of 21 per cent to Sh72.88 per kilo
It was followed by kale (sukuma wiki) which dropped 21.3 per cent to Sh45.3 a kilo.
Kenya’s inflation dropped slightly in August compared to the previous month due to lower vegetable and flour prices.
The rate fell to 4.04 per cent, from 4.35 per cent in July, the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) has said.
Food takes up the largest share (36 per cent) of the basket of goods that is used to calculate inflation, making it the main driver of the cost of living.
“Between July and August 2018, food and non-alcoholic drinks’ index decreased by 0.66 per cent.
This was due to decrease in prices of some foodstuffs outweighing increases recorded in respect of others,” the KNBS said in a statement.
Tomato price drop
Tomatoes recorded the steepest price drop of 21 per cent to Sh72.88 per kilo, followed by kale (sukuma wiki) which dropped 21.3 per cent to Sh45.3 a kilo.
Other food items whose price dropped include maize flour, down 20.9 per cent to Sh45.30 a kilo, and maize grain which recorded a 17.6 per cent drop in price to Sh42.39 a kilo.
Carrots also recorded a slight drop in price of 2.9 per cent to Sh61.19 a kilo with beans falling slightly to Sh106.9 from Sh107.66 per kilo the previous month.
During the period, the price of diesel dropped by 0.5 per cent to Sh103.6 a litre while kerosene, used mostly by low-income households for lighting and powering cooking stoves, recorded a slight drop of 0.9 per cent to Sh85.9 a litre.
Homes that consumed 200-kilowatt hours (kWh) in August paid Sh4,392, a 6.6 per cent rise from Sh4,122 the previous month.
At 4.04 per cent, the August inflation is within the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) preferred range of between 2.5 per cent and 7.5 per cent.
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