KEY FACTS

In the September 2023 quarter compared with June 2023 quarter, the Consumer Price Index (CPI) increased by 0.8 per cent and the Underlying CPI rose by 0.9 per cent.

• Miscellaneous Goods & Services Group experienced a 3.1 per cent increase driven by highly cost of personal care products of 5.4 per cent.
• Household Maintenance Group saw a 3.1 per cent increase due to high cost of fabric household goods and major household appliances.
• Health Group rose by 1.3 per cent.
• Household Utilities Group up by 1.2 per cent
• Followed by minor increases in the Food (up by 0.9 per cent), Transport (0.7 per cent), Alcohol and Tobacco (0.6 per cent), Education (0.6 per cent), Recreation & Culture and Restaurants & Hotels (increased by 0.1 per cent)

Annual change

From the September 2022 quarter to the September 2023 quarter, the CPI inflation rate was 7.4 percent with the Underlying CPI of 7.3 percent.

• The annual percentage contribution of Food and Non-alcoholic beverages was a significant 13.4 per cent.

The prices of various subgroups saw significant increases. Fish and seafood increased by 60%, Poultry & eggs and Mineral water, soft drinks, fruit and vegetable juices increased by 15%, Oils and fats rose by 13%, Coffee, tea and cocoa by 12%, Vegetables by 11%, Bread and cereals up by 9%, Meat increased by 7%, Sugar, jam, honey, chocolate and confectionery by 6%, Food products by 4%. While the Fruit group saw a slight decrease of 2%

• The Transport group experienced an increase of 4.7 per cent. The main factor that contributed to the upward movement in the index for this group was mainly higher cost international airfares and cost of vehicles.
• Alcoholic beverages and tobacco contributed an increase of 2.8% to the CPI

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Information about CPI

The Consumer Price Index covers price changes of the basket of goods and services consumed by all households on Rarotonga (the main island).

The base year is 2019. Prices are collected for 199 items and from selected outlets around Rarotonga. Individual prices are combined using weights from the Household Income and Expenditure Survey (HIES) conducted in 2015/2016. The HIES information was used to select the basket of goods and services.

The inclusion of an underlying measure is a recent improvement and it is published at the same time as the CPI. The underlying measure excludes items of a highly volatile nature, items that are subject to policy changes.

It excludes some items fruits, vegetables, meat and fish, electricity rates, purchases of new and used motor vehicles, petrol and diesel, international airfares and domestic airfares.

The CPI is calculated as chain-linked Jevons indices (change in the geometric average price). At the higher level, indices will be calculated with standard Laspeyres-type aggregation.