Producer Price Index inched up by 0.83

Story: Boahene Asamoah
THE Producer Price Index (PPI), which measures the average changeover time in the prices received by domestic producers for the production of their goods and services, inched up by 0.83 per cent for the month of August this year.
For the month of July, however, it edged up by 0.99 per cent.
Briefing the press in Accra on Friday, the Deputy Government Statistician, Prof. Nicholas N.N. Nsowah-Nuamah, said the manufacturing index inched up by 0.81 per cent, while the index for mining and quarrying also edged up by 1.29 per cent.
He said the utilities index, on the other hand, remained unchanged for the period under review and explained that the rise in the mining index was from the mining of non-ferrous metal ores, excluding uranium and thorium.
The deputy director said that the index for quarrying of stone, sand and clay inched by 0.32 after recording no change in the previous month, while the index for salt mining slightly went up 0.18 per cent after it dropped by 7.72 per cent in the previous month.
Prof. Nsowah-Nuamah said “the manufacture of plastic products, manufacturers of footwear, other fabricated metal products, metalworking service activities, refined petroleum production, processing and preservation of meat, fish, fruit, vegetables, oil and fats all showed increases in their indices”.
He said the utilities index, which comprised production, transmission and distribution of electricity and collection, purification and distribution of water, remained unchanged following the same trend in the previous month’s index.
The PPI measures price change from the perspective of the producer. This contrasts with other measures such as the Consumer Price Index (CPI), which measure price change from the purchasers’ perspective.
Prices of approximately 950 items are collected from 209 establishments each month to determine the changes in the index.