The inflation rate reduced and reached 15.2 percent in the 11th month of the Iranian calendar, Bahman (the month ending on January 20th), according to Mohammad Baqer Nowbakht, head of Management and Planning Organization (MPO).
Nowbakht also said that year on year inflation in Bahman reached 14.4 percent, which is promising further improvement in the coming months.
According to Nowbakht, the monthly inflation rate shows zero change due to negative inflation rate in different categories of consumer products such as food, drinks and tobacco products (the inflation rate was - 0.5 percent in these categories) and the 0.3 percent inflation in the category of non-food consumer products.
The MPO statistics come as the Central Bank of Iran (CBI) says in its latest report that the inflation rate in the twelve months ending in Bahman registered a 0.6 percentage point decrease, from 15.8% in the month ealrer.
Inflation has been on the decline over the past months and is now hovering around 15 percent. President Hassan Rouhani has on several occasions said the government’s top priority is to reduce the inflation rate, which reached 40.4 percent in October 2014. The administration is trying to lower the inflation rate through a long-term plan.
Experts believe that former administrations’ monetary policies and economic reform plans are the main causes of the galloping inflation over the past years. However, the Rouhani administration seems to have been successful in achieving its primary goal of lowering the inflation rate.
