By Emmanuel Nduka
Nigeria’s economic woes worsened in April 2024, as inflation rate rose to 33.69 percent compared to March 2024 headline inflation rate which stood at 33.20 percent.
This was disclosed by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS)’s Consumer Price Index (CPI) report released on Wednesday.
“In April 2024, the headline inflation rate increased to 33.69% relative to the March 2024 head line inflation rate which was 33.20%,” the Bureau said in its report.
The April 2024 headline inflation rate showed an increase of 0.49 percent points when compared to the March 2024 headline inflation rate.
“On a year-on-year basis, the headline inflation rate was 11.47% points higher compared to the rate recorded in April 2023, which was 22.22%.
READ ALSO: FIFA Announces Plans For Inaugural Women’s Club World Cup, Appoints Secretary-General
“This shows that the headline inflation rate (year-on-year basis) increased in the month of April 2024 when compared to the same month in the preceding year (i.e., April 2023).
“Furthermore, on a month-on-month basis, the headline inflation rate in April 2024 was 2.29%, which was 0.73% lower than the rate recorded in March 2024 (3.02%). This means that in the month of April 2024, the rate of increase in the average price level is less than the rate of in crease in the average price level in March 2024,” the report added.
Heritage Times HT reports that prices of food and basic commodities have skyrocketed, as Nigerians continue to battle with high cost of living and one of the country’s toughest economic crises sparked by the current government’s twin policies of petrol subsidy removal and unification of forex windows.
With the fresh inflation report by the NBS, the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), expected to review the country’s interest rate from 24.75 percent.
