The economic survey for 2020-21 has suggested revision in the weightage of food items to gauge the true picture of inflation in the country, and said new sources of price data also need to be incorporated in the wake of increasing retail e-commerce transactions. As per the survey, the current spike in consumer price-based retail inflation of food prices is mainly a supply-side phenomenon. The survey noted that the weights of all items in retail inflation are based on the NSO household consumption expenditure survey of 2011-12, adding the weight of food items in the index might have significantly decreased over the decade since then.
Fitch Ratings on Thursday slashed India's GDP growth projection for FY23 to 7 per cent, saying the economy is expected to slow against the backdrop of global economy, elevated inflation and high interest rate. In June, it had forecast 7.8 per cent growth for India. "We expect the economy to slow given the global economic backdrop, elevated inflation and tighter monetary policy. "We now expect the economy to grow 7 per cent in the financial year to end-March 2023 (FY23) from 7.8 per cent previously, with FY24 also slowing to 6.7 per cent from 7.4 per cent before," Fitch said in its September edition of the Global Economic Outlook.
Retail inflation during the first month of the current fiscal stood at 2.9 per cent, down from 4.6 per cent a year ago. Food inflation based on Consumer Food Price Index declined to a low of 0.1 per cent during the financial year 2018-19, the survey said.
Retail inflation softened to 6.71 per cent in July due to moderation in food prices but remained above the Reserve Bank's comfort level of 6 per cent for the seventh consecutive month. With retail inflation continuing to remain high despite a fall in prices of vegetables and edible oils, among other commodities in July, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) might go for another rate hike in September. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) based retail inflation was at 7.01 per cent in June and 5.59 per cent in July 2021. It was above 7 per cent from April to June this fiscal.
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Declining prices of food items like vegetables pulled down retail inflation to 5.59 per cent in July, bringing it back within the RBI's comfort zone after two months, official data showed on Thursday. The retail inflation based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI) had remained above 6 per cent during May and June. The government has mandated the RBI to maintain retail inflation at 4 per cent, with a margin of 2 per cent on either side. The CPI based inflation stood at 6.26 per cent in June 2021 and 6.73 per cent in July 2020.
Subdued prices of food items like vegetables pulled down retail inflation for the third month in a row to 5.3 per cent in August, within the RBI's comfort zone. While the Consumer Price Index (CPI)-based retail inflation declined to 5.3 per cent in August from 6.69 per cent in the same month a year ago, food inflation dipped at a much faster pace to 3.11 per cent from 9.05 per cent in August 2020. The food inflation was also lower than 3.96 per cent in preceding month of July.
The RBI on Friday retained inflation forecast for FY23 at 6.7 per cent amid uncertain price trajectory on "geopolitical shocks" and on hope that inflationary pressures would ease with pick-up in kharif sowing and supply chain improvements. In its previous monetary policy review in June, it had projected retail inflation for 2022-23 at 6.7 per cent, higher from 5.7 per cent forecast in April. The six-member Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) unanimously decided to raise the benchmark repo rate by a steep 50 basis points to 5.40 per cent with immediate effect to tame inflation while supporting growth.
While the farmers are not getting remunerative prices for their produce, at the same time they are forced to pay high prices for items they consume.
'When the average growth in the last three years was just 2.5%, how does that make us the fastest growing country?' 'They only tell you what has happened in the last 2 years; they are not taking into account what happened in FY21 on account of their mistakes.'
On food inflation, RBI said it is likely to soften from the high levels registered in December and the decline is expected to become more pronounced during the fourth quarter of this fiscal as onion prices ease following arrivals of late kharif and rabi harvests.
The opposition party vowed to hit the streets against the "Modi-made inflation" and run a people's movement over price rise.
The Asian Development Bank (ADB) on Wednesday slashed India's GDP growth forecast for FY23 to 7 per cent from the earlier estimate of 7.2 per cent mainly on account of higher inflation and a tight monetary policy. India's economy grew 13.5 per cent year-on-year in the first quarter of 2022-23, reflecting strong growth in services, ADB said in its second supplement to Asian Development Outlook Report 2022 (ADO 2022). "However, GDP growth is revised down from ADO 2022's forecasts to 7 per cent for FY2022 (ending March 2023) and 7.2 per cent for FY2023 (ending March 2024) as price pressures are expected to adversely impact domestic consumption, and sluggish global demand and elevated oil prices will likely be a drag on net exports," ADB said.
Moody's Investors Service has warned that India, along with the Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam are highly vulnerable to volatile food and energy prices in the Asia-Pacific region as the Russia-Ukraine conflict continues to disrupt supplies and raise the cost of agricultural products, especially cereals and vegetable oils, as well as fertilizers and other agricultural inputs. This is so because these countries have a higher weighting of energy and food prices in their consumer price index (CPI) baskets, Moody's said in its report released on Tuesday. The weighting of energy and food in overall Indian CPI stands at over 55 per cent.
The wholesale price-based inflation rose to 2.03 per cent in January, 2021, even as food prices cooled. The WPI inflation was 1.22 per cent in December, 2020 and 3.52 per cent in January last year. While food articles saw softening in inflation in January, manufactured items witnessed hardening of prices, as per data released by the Commerce and Industry ministry.
As per commerce and industry ministry data, food inflation fell to 4.91 per cent in March from 7.79 per cent in the previous month.
In twin blows to Indian economic revival, higher food prices drove retail inflation to a five-month high of 7.4 per cent while factory output fell for the first time in 18 months. The second consecutive month of rise in consumer price index (CPI)-based inflation will add to the pressure on the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to again raise interest rates to tame high prices. Inflation has been above the targeted zone for the ninth month in a row and as per statute, the RBI will now have to explain to the government in writing why it failed to keep prices below 6 per cent.
Chief Economic Adviser K V Subramanian on Friday said there is an "upside potential" in the estimates about the economy during the current financial year amid a faster-than-expected recovery. He said the final print could be better than GDP estimates given by various institutions, including the Reserve Bank of India, which projected contraction of 9.5 per cent during 2020-21. During the second quarter, India's economy recovered faster than expected as a pick-up in manufacturing helped GDP clock a lower contraction of 7.5 per cent and held out hopes for further improvement on consumer demand bouncing back.
'The decision to supply free food grains is not an economically sound decision because the government will find it very difficult in future to charge anything for food grains.'
Inflation targeting framework is now enshrined as a formal agreement by the government and the RBI; thus, it may seem that we are flogging a dead horse, says Soumya Kanti Ghosh.
The inflation figures are based on data collected from limited markets in view of the restrictions imposed on account of coronavirus pandemic.
This is the highest level of wholesale price index-based (WPI) inflation since February, when it was 2.26 per cent.
'The FY2023 inflation outcome is likely to exceed the RBI's current forecast by a wide margin.'
Moody's Investors Service on Thursday slashed India's economic growth projection to 8.8 per cent for 2022 from 9.1 per cent earlier, citing high inflation. In its update to Global Macro Outlook 2022-23, Moody's said high-frequency data suggests that the growth momentum from December quarter 2021 carried through into the first four months this year. However, the rise in crude oil, food and fertilizer prices will weigh on household finances and spending in the months ahead.
Reserve Bank on Wednesday said it expects retail inflation at 5.2 per cent in the first half of the current fiscal and revised downwards the target to 5 per cent for the quarter ended March. While headline inflation at 5 per cent in Feb 2021 remains within the tolerance band, some underline constituents are testing the upper tolerance level. Going forward, the food inflation trajectory will critically depend on the temporal and special progress of southwest monsoon in the 2021 season, RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das said on Wednesday while announcing the first monetary policy for the current fiscal. Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has kept the key repo rate unchanged at 4 per cent to support growth in the current situation.
Spiralling prices pinched the pocket of consumer as edible oil, fuel and many other commodities turned dearer this year amid pandemic-induced disruptions but the inflationary pressure is anticipated to ease, though marginally, in the coming months. As consumers, at retail as well as wholesale levels, are willy-nilly learning to live with the new normal of curbs to contain the spread of coronavirus infections, experts are of the view that elevated inflation is likely to stay longer. After dealing with the devastating blows from the second COVID wave, especially during the April-June period, the economy is well on the revival path but the emergence of Omicron might unsettle the recovery trajectory in the short term.
Declining vegetable prices brought down the retail inflation to a 15-month low of 4.59 per cent in December and within the comfort zone of the Reserve Bank, government data showed on Tuesday. It is for the first time during the current fiscal that the Consumer Price Index (CPI) based inflation print is below 6 per cent or in the RBI's target range of 2 to 6 per cent. The central bank factors in the CPI-based inflation while arriving at its monetary policy. The inflation in December 2020 came down from 6.93 per cent in November, mainly on account of 10.41 per cent decline in vegetable prices over the year-ago period.
The annual rate of inflation based on monthly wholesale price index (WPI) was 1.22 per cent in December as compared to 1.55 per cent in the previous month. It was 2.76 per cent in December 2019. The decline last month was mainly due to lower increase in food prices, data released by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry showed on Thursday. The food inflation for December dropped to 0.92 per cent as compared to 4.27 per cent in the previous month.
A pick-up in farmer income could have a cascading impact on the rural economy, though agriculture is becoming a smaller part of India's overall rural incomes.
The annual rate of inflation based on monthly wholesale price index (WPI) was up at 1.32 per cent in September as compared to 0.16 per cent in the previous month.
A head of its meeting, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) can take some solace from the softening food commodity prices. However, the events surrounding the last few weeks show that the fall may not be uniform across all commodities, and cereals like wheat and rice could be the outliers. A Reuters report said that local wheat prices jumped to a record Rs 23,547 per tonne on Wednesday. That is a 12 per cent rise from the recent lows that followed the government's surprise ban on exports on May 14.
Inflation in food articles during June stood at 2.04 per cent, as against 1.13 per cent in May.
Das said that global economic activity has remained fragile and the surge in COVID-19 cases has subdued early signs of revival.
Pushed by rising prices of essential kitchen items, the retail inflation rose to an eight-month high of 7.34 per cent in September, making the RBI's task to push growth by reducing the interest rate even more difficult in coming the days. The Consumer Price Index (CPI)-based inflation was 6.69 per cent in August and 3.99 per cent in September 2019. Inflation has been hovering above 4 per cent since October 2019.
The internals of the food inflation are worrying, given a broad-based uptick across categories that tend to be sticky, such as proteins, and a narrower-than-expected reduction in inflation for vegetables.
India's GDP may turn positive at 1.3 per cent in the third quarter of 2020-21, having witnessed contraction in the previous two quarters due to the coronavirus pandemic, as the number of cases is falling and public spending has started rising, according to a report. The government will release the GDP numbers for the October-December quarter of the current fiscal on Friday. Projecting that the gross domestic product (GDP) may have returned to the black in the last quarter of the calendar year 2020, DBS Bank in the report said the full-year growth in real terms may be at a negative 6.8 per cent.
The report, however, said it remains watchful of the upside risks to inflation emanating from pass-through of minimum support prices (MSPs), adverse movement in crude oil prices, volatility in global financial markets, lagged impact of the rupee weakness on input prices, adverse implications from fiscal slippage and staggered impact of HRA increases by states and its second-round impact.
The wholesale price-based inflation rose to an eight-month high of 1.48 per cent in October, as manufactured products turned costlier. The WPI inflation was 1.32 per cent in September and zero per cent in October last year. This is the highest level of wholesale price index-based (WPI) inflation since February when it was 2.26 per cent.
Inflation in food articles during May stood at 1.13 per cent, as against 2.55 per cent in April.
'Nobody is talking about the inequality that is going to come.'
Housing loan, car loans, personal loans and education loan will get costlier in the months to come.
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