08 January 2024 – Guimaras. The inflation for low-income households in Guimaras province slowed to 6.1 percent in December 2023 against 6.6 percent a month ago and 8.1 percent in December 2022 due to the dwindling retail cost on Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages with 6.9 percent price increase, based on the latest price statistics released by the Philippines Statistics Authority (PSA).

Figure 1: Inflation Rates in Guimaras (Bottom 30% Income Households), All Items & Food & NonAlcoholic Beverages: December 2022- December 2023 (2018=100)

“Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages showed a huge share of 88.1 percent to the inflation of the bottom 30% income households, followed by Personal Care, and Miscellaneous Goods and Services with 7.1 percent inflation and Clothing and Footwear with 1.9 inflation sharing an 8.1, 1.9 percent, respectively,” Provincial Statistics Officer Nelida B. Losare said.

Table 1. Top 3 major sources of trend and contributors to Guimaras inflation rate for bottom 30% income households: December 2023

The Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages’ slower inflation was due to the sluggish price change of food items from 9.5 percent in November 2023 to 7.1 percent in December 2023. The 7.1 percent inflation on Personal Care and Miscellaneous Goods and Services, brought by the slow-moving prices of Personal Care, decrease by 4.4% from an inflation of 11.5%. Likewise, the 1.9 inflation of Clothing and Footwear, pushed by the decelerating retail value of Clothing from 4.3 to 3.2 percent.

“In terms of contributions to the bottom 30% income inflation in December, Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages still topped the rank with 71.7 percent splits followed by Alcoholic Beverages & Tobacco with 15.7 percent inflation and Restaurants and Accommodation Services with 15.2 percent inflation posting a significant cut of 10.1 and 9.0 percent, respectively,” Losare said.

The data showed that cereals, with 15.0 percent inflation, had a significant contribution to the 54.7 percent inflation on Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages, followed by Other vegetables, fresh or chilled with -25.9 percent inflation contributing 34.0 percent and Meat, fresh, chilled or frozen with 14.9 inflation, sliced 9.7 percent.

Losare also expounded that Spirits and liquors with 16.6 percent inflation showed a large share of 5.3 percent to Alcoholic Beverages and Tobacco commodity group. The prices of Restaurants, café, and the like with 15.2 percent inflation supplied 9.0 percent to the December inflation of Restaurants and Accommodation Services.

Losare further expounded that the Inflation Rate is the rate of change in the Consumer Price Index (CPI) derived by computing the indices relative to the same period in the previous year or month.

“Currently, the bottom 30% income HHs in Guimaras posted a 130.6 CPI, this indicates that a typical lowincome Guimarasnon household needs 1,306.00 pesos in December 2023 to purchase a basket of goods and services worth 1,000.00 pesos in 2018," Losare said

Losare also highlighted that based on the relative poverty concept, households whose per capita income falls below the bottom 30 percent of the cumulative per capita distribution belong to the low-income group.

“The inflation rate for the bottom 30 percent income households, who are the most vulnerable to economic and social difficulties, was computed to monitor their welfare,” Losare said