In March, the annual rate of inflation as measured by the RPI was 6.95%, down from 7.11% in February. However, it is still much higher than last year, when in March 2022 the annual rate of inflation stood at 4.43%.

The data released today from the National Statistics Office show that the largest upward impact on annual inflation was measured in the Food Index (+2.53 percentage points) largely due to higher prices of take-aways.

The second and third largest impacts were measured in the Housing Index (+1.15 percentage points) and the Other goods and services Index (+0.57 percentage points), mainly on account of higher prices of house maintenance services and cleaning products, respectively, the NSO said.

It noted that the Water, electricity, gas and fuels Index registered the lowest annual inflation rate of 0.00%, since the prices of all subcomponents remained unchanged.

The 12-month moving average rate for March stood at 6.85%.

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