Inflation in Ukraine hits 0% in July, annual rate rises to 5.4% – statistics
Consumer price growth in Ukraine dropped to zero in July 2024, following a surge to 2.2% in June from 0.6% in May, the State Statistics Service reported on Friday.
The service said that in July 2023, consumer prices had decreased by 0.6%, so in annual terms, inflation as of July 2024 grew to 5.4%, up from 4.8% in June and 3.3% in May.
In July 2024, underlying inflation rose to 0.7% from 0.5% in June and 0.3% in May. Given that in July 2023, annual underlying inflation was zero, and it reached 5.7% at the end of last month, compared to 5% in June and 4.4% in May.
According to the statistics agency, prices for alcoholic beverages and tobacco products increased by 1% in July compared to June of this year, including tobacco products by 1.3% and alcoholic beverages by 0.7%.
Clothing and footwear became cheaper by 3.7%, including clothing by 4.1% and footwear by 3.4%.
Transport prices rose by 0.7%, mainly due to an increase in the cost of travel on road passenger transport by 0.8%, as well as fuel and lubricants by 0.6%.
As reported, inflation in Ukraine dropped to 5.1% in 2023 after spiking to 26.6% in 2022, up from 10.0% in 2021.
At the end of July, the National Bank of Ukraine downgraded its inflation forecast for this year from 8.2% to 8.5%. The NBU expects inflation to rise to 7.9% by the end of the third quarter of this year. According to its forecasts, consumer price growth will continue to accelerate into the first quarter of 2025, reaching a peak of 9.7%, before beginning to decline.