At the press conference (Photo: VNA) Hanoi (VNA) – Vietnam's consumer price index (CPI), a key measure ofinflation, climbed 3.77% year-on-year in the first quarter, General Director of the GeneralStatistics Office (GSO) Nguyen Thi Huong told a press conference inHanoi on March 29.
Huong attributed the rise primarily to a surge indomestic rice prices. This increase mirrored a rise in export rice prices andwas further fueled by higher demand for glutinous and jasmine rice varietiesduring the Kitchen Gods' Day and Lunar New Year holidays. The rice price jumped21.71% annually during the quarter, pushing up the overall CPI by 0.55percentage points.
Core inflation, which excludes volatile items like food, energy, and health and education services, remained relatively stable, rising 2.81% annuallyin the first quarter.
Looking at monthly figures, the March CPI rose 1.12% compared toDecember 2023 and 3.97% year-on-year. However, it did see a slight decrease of0.23% compared to February.
Prices of water, electricity,education, medicines, and health services recorded respective increases of10.58%, 9.38%, 9.02% and 6.51%.
Meanwhile, those of food and dining services, education, andtransportation all decreased slightly on a month-on-month basis, by 0.76%,0.29%, and 0.03%, respectively.
Year-on-year comparisons also revealed a 1.47% decline in thecost of postal and telecommunication services.
On a different note, the prices of gold and US dollarsexperienced significant increases in March, rising 22.71% and 4.32%year-on-year, respectively./.
