Also listed are non-food items such as international flight tickets and house rent, whose prices climbed during the same period.
The Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) has revealed six major food items whose prices increased in the space of one month, from October to November this year.
In its latest survey report published on Friday, November 29, KNBS listed the likes of cooking oil as well as sugar, maize flour, tomatoes, maize grains and wheat flour among the commodities whose prices substantially rose in November.
Also listed are non-food items such as international flight tickets and house rent, whose prices climbed during the same period.
KNBS went on to reveal that the price of sifted and fortified maize flour rose 5.1 per cent and 4.9 per cent respectively while the prices of cooking oil, tomatoes, maize grain, and monthly house rent rose by 3.1 per cent, 2.6 per cent, 1.4 per cent, and 1.1 per cent respectively, with the increase affecting the inflation rate.
“The overall annual inflation rate as measured by the Consumer Price Index (CPI) was 2.8 per cent, in November 2024; a slight increase from an inflation rate of 2.7 per cent recorded in October 2024. The month-to-month inflation rate was 0.3 per cent in November 2024,” KNBS revealed in its monthly report.
“The annual inflation was mainly due to an increase in prices of commodities under the Classification of Individual Consumption by Purpose (COICOP) divisions.”
However, the Bureau of Statistics cited eight commodities whose prices dropped significantly. Among the commodities whose prices dropped in November are electricity, fresh milk, carrots, cabbages, onions, potatoes, and cooking gas.
The prices of 200 watts and 50 watts of electricity dropped by 0.3 per cent while the prices of fresh milk, carrots, and cabbage dropped by 2 per cent, 2.4 per cent and 2.6 per cent respectively.
Similarly, the prices of onions, potatoes, and cooking gas declined by 2.7 per cent, 2.8 per cent, and 1.1 per cent respectively.
The move comes hardly a month after KNBS announced a substantial drop in the level of inflation from 3.6 per cent to 2.7 per cent following the decline in the prices of several food items.
In the report released on Thursday, October 31, Kenya’s inflation rate dropped from 6.9 per cent in October 2023 to 2.7 per cent in October 2024. Specifically, electricity prices dropped by 8.0 per cent for 50 kilowatts and by 14.4 per cent for 200 kilowatts.
Similarly, there were notable reductions in the prices of fuel, sugar, maize flour, and wheat flour over the period, but prices increased for items such as cooking gas, cooking oil, mangoes, oranges, tomatoes, beef, and kale.
The report by KNBS came after an agricultural survey by the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) projected a price drop in major food items in the month of October including sugar, milk, rice, wheat flour and maize flour.
