Public market, Lautoka, Viti Levu, Fiji.
Food inflation is expected to decline in the coming months as the supply of agricultural market items normalize.
This is according to the Reserve Bank of Fiji’s economic review for the month of June.
However this does not apply to those items that require longer production time, posing the risk of continued upward pressure on inflation in the remaining months of 2016.
Given these developments, RBF states the year-end inflation forecast of 2.0 percent is upward biased.
It states inflation rose to 5.2 percent in May from 3.8 percent in April.
This is a result of the domestic supply shortages and temporary price hikes in agricultural market products caused by the recent natural disasters.
Prices rose by 5.6 percent in both the Central and Western divisions while prices in the Northern division were higher by 3.3 percent when compared to a year ago.