Controlling high food prices is major pre-occupation for gov’t – Akufo-Addo

President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has said that the government is working hard to bring down inflation rate and also food prices.

This, he said, is a major pre-occupation of government presently.

Speaking at the 22^nd General Meeting of the Presbyterian Church of Ghana at Kwahu Abetifi in the Eastern Region, President Akufo-Addo said: “Reining in inflation and bringing down food prices is a major pre-occupation of government and hopefully, this season’s emerging successful harvest will assist us in this regard.”

“Arrangements are being made with market women, market queens, in popular parlance, to provide trucks to evacuate foodstuffs from rural markets to urban centres to help reduce cost of food prices in the city,” he added.

His comments come at a time analysts including a senior lecturer at the University of Ghana Business School Dr Patrick Asuming, have expressed fears that high food prices are going to be with Ghanaians for long time due to the rising rate of inflation.

Inflation rate for the month of July 2022 was 31.7 per cent, the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) announced on Wednesday August 10.

This is up from the 29.8 per cent recorded in June.

On year-on-year basis, the difference between Food inflation (32.3%) and Non-food (31.3%) was 1 percentage points.

On month-on-month basis, food inflation (3.3%)  records a higher rate than non-food (3.0%), leading to 0.3 percentage point difference.

CPI-July-2022_Rev-1Download

The percentage point increase in Non-food inflation (2.1) between June and July 2022 is higher than food inflation (1.6).

The percentage point difference between inflation for imported items (33.9%) and locally domestic items (30.9%) was 3%.

Speaking on the Key Points on TV3 Saturday August 13, Dr Asuming said “the high inflation is going to stay with is for a while, we all have to accept the highest inflation in the region we are seeing is going to be with us for sometime.”

He stressed “Ghanaians must condition their minds that food prices are not going to come down any time soon.”

Source: 3news.com|Ghana