Davao Region registers 2.4% inflation in February

THE INFLATION in Davao Region rose to 2.4% in February as the national inflation lowered to 2.6% during the same period.

In a press release dated March 12, the Philippine Statistics Office (PSA) Davao Region bared that the region’s inflation increased by 0.2% from January of this year. The rise was mainly caused by increases prices of food, beverages, tobacco, and communication.

The annual inflation rate of food and non-alcoholic beverages rose from 0.2% in January to 1.1%; alcoholic beverages and tobacco rose from 13.8% to 14.4%; and communication rose from 0.0% to 0.7%.

Other basic needs like transportation, housing, water, electricity, gas, and other fuels showed a slower increases in its respective indices.

Transport went down from 3.7% to 2.4% while housing, water, electricity, gas, and other fuels decreased from 3.0% to 2.2%.

Davao del Norte and Davao de Oro had the highest inflation rate at 2.6% followed by Davao del Sur at 2.5% and Davao Oriental at 1.0%.

The purchasing power of peso (PPP) in the region also decreased to 81 centavos. Davao del Sur had the highest PPP at 82 centavos followed by Davao del Norte at 81 centavos, and Davao de Oro and Davao Oriental at 80 centavos

Despite the rise of the inflation rate in the region, it was still significantly lower compared to the inflation rate in the previous year at 4.5%.

Last March 5, the PSA released a report on the downtrend of the country’s inflation rate. From 2.9% in January, it lowered to 2.6% in February. It was also significantly lower than last year which is at 3.8%.

In response to that, Davao City Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Inc. released a statement stating that the low inflation could benefit the business community and hoped that it would protected in order to keep businesses afloat especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.