The Industrial Price Index (IPRI) went down by 12.4% in the Canary Islands during the month of January as compared to the same period last year, due to lower energy costs (-28.8%). This is according to the data published this Friday by the National Statistics Institute (INE).
On the other hand, prices rose in the other groups; intermediate goods by 14.5%, consumer goods by 10.3%, non-durable consumer goods by 10.4% and capital goods by 7.8%.
The Canary Islands was the second country’s region with the highest drop in the annual rate of the Industrial Price Index, with a decrease of 11.1 points, given that industrial inflation in December was -1.3%. On a monthly basis, industrial prices fell by 11.8% in the archipelago, with a 22.2% drop in energy.
In Spain as a whole, industrial prices moderated their year-on-year growth in January to 8.2%, thus registering their lowest rate since March 2021. It was from that month onwards that industrial inflation began an escalation that has led it to record double-digit rates for more than 20 months.
With the year-on-year rise in January, more than 6.5 points lower than in December, industrial sector inflation has now been positive for 25 consecutive months.
The moderation in the year-on-year rate of industrial prices recorded in January is mainly due to energy, whose annual change fell by almost 20 points to 3.3%, due to lower electricity and gas production, and to intermediate goods, whose annual rate fell by almost two points to 8.8%, due to lower costs in the manufacture of basic chemical products, iron products and animal feedstuffs.
By contrast, the year-on-year rate of non-durable consumer goods prices rose by one point in January, to 15.6%, due to the rise in the manufacture of beverages and, to a lesser extent, other food products.
According to the INE, excluding energy, industrial prices showed a year-on-year increase of 10.6% last January, five tenths of a percentage point lower than in December 2022 and almost 2.5 points below the general rate.
By activity, the largest price increases compared with January 2022 were in coking and refining of petroleum products (+30%); the food industry (+20.4%); the paper industry (+16.3%) and the manufacture of other non-metallic mineral products (+16.1%).
The only year-on-year decreases in prices were in electricity and gas supply (-5%) and metallurgy (-0.2%).
