The year-on-year harmonized inflation significantly increased, it reached the value 9.6% in March 2022
According to the European harmonized methodology, consumer prices in March 2022 increased by 9.6% year-on-year, in February 2022 this value was 8.3%. The month-on-month HICP inflation reached 1.7%, while in March last year it was 0.6%.
The average annual HICP inflation rate (the average of the harmonized indices of consumer prices over the last 12 months compared to the average of the previous 12 months) was 4.7% in March 2022. This was 0.7 percentage points (p.p.) more than in February 2022. This indicator is important for assessing price stability in the country.
The value of month-on-month HICP inflation 1.7% in March 2022 was affected by price increases mainly in these divisions: Food and non-alcoholic beverages (positive contribution of the whole division 0.41 p.p., of which food had a positive contribution of 0.38 p.p. and non-alcoholic beverages a positive contribution of 0.03 p.p.), Transport (positive contribution of 0.36 p.p.), Miscellaneous goods and services (positive contribution of 0.18 p.p.), Communication (positive contribution of 0.17 p.p.), Housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels (positive contribution of 0.16 p.p.), Alcoholic beverages and tobacco (positive contribution of 0.16 p.p.), Clothing and footwear (positive contribution of 0.09 p.p.), Furniture, furnishings and routine household maintenance (positive contribution of 0.08 p.p.) and Restaurants and hotels (positive contribution of 0.07 p.p.).
Statistical office publishes data on Harmonized Indices of Consumer Prices (HICP) usually on the day of their publication by Eurostat; a few days after the national CPI inflation release. This is inflation calculated accord-ing to the uniform EU methodology in order to ensure the mutual comparability of consumer price indices be-tween countries. Consumer baskets differ in part, The HICP, unlike the CPI, does not include the components "Imputed rents" and selected items related to major repairs and household maintenance, which results in cer-tain differences in the weights of the other components.