This report presents the Inflation Rate (IR), Consumer Price Index (CPI), and Purchasing Power of Peso (PPP) for all income households in the province of Cavite during the month of August 2022. Inflation Rate (IR) is the annual rate of change or the year-on-year change of the CPI expressed in percent. Inflation is interpreted in terms of declining purchasing power of money. Headline inflation in the Province of Cavite eased to 4.4 percent in August 2022, after six consecutive months of acceleration. With this month’s inflation, the Philippine’s average inflation from January to August 2022 stood at 3.6 percent. In August 2021, inflation rate was posted at 4.4 percent (see Table 1 and Figure 1). The slowdown in inflation in August 2022 was primarily due to the lower annual increment recorded in the index for heavily weighted Food and Non – alcoholic Beverages at 4.4 percent, from 6.0 percent in the previous month. Similarly, contributing to the uptrend in the overall inflation during the period were the higher annual increments in the indices of the following commodity groups as compared with their previous month’s inflation rates: Transport, 11.8 percent Restaurant and Accommodation Services, 2.3 percent Housing, Water, Electricity, Gas and Other Fuels, 4.3 percent Information and Communication, -0.7 percent Personal Care, and Miscellaneous Goods and Services, 2.3 percent On the other hand, six (6) commodity groups showed higher inflation rate compared to last month’s inflation: Alcoholic Beverages and Tobacco, 9.1 percent Clothing and Footwear, 3.0 percent Furnishing, Household Equipment and Routine Household Maintenance, 3.2 percent Health, 4.5 percent Recreation, Sports and Culture, 2.3 percent Education Services, 1.2 percent Meanwhile, Financial Services was stable this month at 0.0 percent. Consumer Price Index (CPI) is an indicator of the change in the average retail prices of a fixed basket of goods and services commonly purchased by households relative to a base year. The CPI in the Province of Cavite for the month of August 2022 was measured at 116.4 index point, higher by 0.2 index point compared to July 2022 CPI recorded of 116.2 index point. This means that for a typical Caviteño household needed an additional of Php16.40 to afford same goods and services purchased or availed at PhP100.00 in May 2018. CPI for all commodity groups for the month of August 2022 compared to July 2022 and August 2021 was shown in Table 2. Purchasing Power of the Peso (PPP) shows how much the peso in the base period is worth in the current period. It gives an indication of the real value of the peso in a given period relative to the peso value in the base period. Purchasing Power of Peso is inversely related to inflation rate. Thus, as inflation rate increases, PPP decrease. The province purchasing power of the peso (PPP) or real value of the peso for the month of August 2022 was 0.86 centavos, lowest for the year 2022. This means that the value of Php1.00 in 2018 only worth Php0.86 centavos for the month of August 2022. The highest purchasing power of peso for the period of June 2021 to June 2022 was 0.90 centavos, observed on August to October 2021 while the lowest was recorded in July and August 2022 at 0.86 centavos.
