The consumer price index ( CPI ) rose by 0.49 percent over the previous month, led by a surge in food prices after flooding in central region and adjustment in school fees.

The figure represented a rise of 5.14 percent against December last year, and 5.92 percent year-on-year, according to statistics released by the General Statistic Office (GSO) on October 24.

Director of the GSO’s Price Statistics Department Nguyen Duc Thang said the reduction of petroleum prices on October 7 helped buffer the CPI rise in October.

Eight out of 11 items in the commodity basket posted price increases, with the highest level of 0.86 percent seen in food and restaurant services. Medicines and health care services saw the smallest increase at 0.1 percent.

The prices of post and telecommunication as well as transport services declined by 0.03 and 0.17 percent, respectively.

Meanwhile, the domestic gold price was down by 2.87 percent to 37 million VND per tael, while the price of US dollar was down by 0.18 percent in comparison to September.

The GSO said that the commodities price will be affected by many factors in the market in the remaining months of this year, when the disbursement of State-funded construction investment will be accelerated and businesses will also expand production to serve the year-end shopping season. The prices of a number of goods in the world market are also forecast to rise together with increasing demand for the imports of materials.

However, experts say the CPI would not see any sudden change in November, rising by an estimated 0.5-0.6 percent from this month.-VNA