Lerato Mbhiza
South Africa’s inflation rate rose to a three-month high in September on the back of higher food and energy prices, maintaining the case for the central bank to keep borrowing costs higher for much longer.
Annual inflation accelerated to 5.4% from 4.8% in August, Pretoria-based Statistics South Africa said on its website. The figure matched the median of 12 economists’ estimates in a Bloomberg survey.
Core inflation, which excludes food and energy costs, slowed to 4.5% last month from 4.8% in August, compared with a 4.7% reading expected by economists.
Tuesday’s data showed that egg prices registered a monthly increase of 0.3% after a decline of 0.4% in August.
“Prices for poultry-related products deserve a close watch in the coming months to gauge the impact of the avian flu outbreak,” StatsSA said in a note accompanying the data.
Frank Black more, lead economist at KPMG warned that rates
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