06 February 2025– Guimaras. The Guimaras’ inflation rate eased to 2.7% at the beginning of 2025, against 2.8% in December 2024, and 4.6 percent inflation in January 2024, which is 1.9 percentage points slower based on the latest price data released by the Philippines Statistics Authority (PSA).

“The downtrend in the inflation in January 2025 was primarily influenced by the slower rate of change on the year-on-year price changes in the heavily weighted food and non-alcoholic beverages at 4.2 percent during the month, from 4.6 percent in December 2024,” Provincial Statistics Officer Nelida B. Losare said.

“The slower annual price change on health at -0.4 percent in January 2025 from 2.7 percent in the previous month and recreation, sport and culture at 4.1 percent from 5.7 percent a month ago also contributed to the sluggish overall inflation,” Losare added.

Food and non-alcoholic beverages shared 65.3 percent to the downtrend of January inflation, while health, and recreation, sport and culture spliced 29.4 and 2.9 percent respectively.

“The slower inflation trend of food and non-alcoholic beverages were mainly drove by the slow-moving price movement of Vegetables, tubers, plantains, cooking bananas and pulses, particularly pumpkins, squash and gourds, fresh or chilled with 0.8 percent inflation from 20.3 percent rate, while health was influenced by inpatient care services, mainly inpatient curative and rehabilitative services with 4.4 percent from 12.3 percent,” Losare said.

Likewise, the slow-moving inflation rate was also noted in the other two commodity groups: clothing and footwear, at 0.3 percent in January 2025 from 2.4 percent in December 2024; and Furnishings, Household Equipment and Routine Household Maintenance at -0.5 percent from -0.3 percent.

In contrast, the following were the items with faster inflation in January 2025 against December 2024: 

• Alcoholic Beverages and Tobacco, 4.6 percent from 1.5 percent 

• Transport, 2.4 percent from 2.1 percent 

• Personal care, and miscellaneous goods and services, 1.7 percent from 1.5 percent

While the other 5 commodities retained their previous month’s inflation rate (housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels: 2.6 percent, information and communication: 3.3 percent, education services: 0.0 percent, restaurants and accommodation services: -5.7 percent, and financial services; 0.0 percent).

Meanwhile, in January 2025, the overall inflation rate in Guimaras was primarily influenced by three major commodity groups.

The largest contributor was food and non-alcoholic beverages at 75.4 percent of the province’s inflation rate, or 2.04 percentage points, with the notable decreased primarily driven by a significant 16.0% slow price movement in rice, impacting overall food costs.

Housing, water, electricity, gas, and other fuels followed closely at 14.8 percent share, or 0.40 percentage points contribution to the inflation, with a significant impact from electricity prices across all sources—coal, solar, and hydro—showing an inflation rate of 7.8%.

Losare also highlighted that core inflation, which excludes selected food and energy items, slowed to 1.5 percent in January 2025 from 1.7 percent in the previous month. In January 2024, core inflation was higher at 4.1 percent. (Table 1)

Inflation in Western Visayas continued to decline in January 2025, with Guimaras recording a 2.7% inflation rate, slightly lower than its 2.8% rate in December 2024. This places Guimaras higher than Antique and Capiz (both at 2.3%) but lower than Iloilo, which posted the highest inflation in the region at 5.4%.

Among other provinces, Aklan matched Antique and Capiz at 2.3%, while Negros Occidental registered the same rate as Guimaras at 2.7%. The region’s inflation slowdown reflects stabilizing prices for essential goods and services after a period of volatility in 2024.

Guimaras, which recorded one of the highest inflation peaks in the region at 7.2% in March 2024, has now aligned more closely with the regional trend of price stabilization.

“The Inflation Rate is the rate of change in the CPI derived by computing the indices relative to the same period in the previous year or month, and currently, Guimaras Province posted a 134.6 CPI, translating that a typical Guimarasnon household needs 1,346.00 pesos in January 2025 to purchase a basket of goods and services worth 1000 pesos in 2018," Losare clarified.

“The Purchasing Power of the Peso (PPP) in Guimaras dropped to 0.74 in January 2024. This indicates that one peso in 2018 is now worth 0.74 centavos, recording a devaluation 0.01 from 0.75 PPP in December 2024. PPP in January 2024 was at 0.76 centavos,” Losare added.