Rising fuel costs have been a primary driver of inflation. (Credit: João Sousa/L’Orient Today)
BEIRUT — Once again, consumer prices more than doubled year-on-year last month, with October 2021 prices standing 173.57 percent higher than those of October 2020, according to the latest data from the government’s Central Administration of Statistics.
This marks the 16th month in a row that Lebanon has recorded triple-digit year-on-year inflation, meaning at least a doubling of prices compared to the same month the year before.
Since the beginning of the financial crisis in July 2019, the consumer price index has risen a total of 558.8 percent, meaning prices are more than six times higher than they were at the start of the crisis. The consumer price index uses a basket of commonly purchased consumer goods as reference points to calculate inflation.
October’s dramatic inflation was registered across virtually all types of consumer goods, but none more so than transportation, where costs exploded 508.23 percent year over year, a six-fold increase.
As in previous months, October saw a further reduction in fuel subsidies, with the category of “liquid fuels” rising in cost by 100.99 percent in just one month, meaning that at the end of October they cost double what they had at the end of September. At the end of October 20 liters of 95-octane gasoline, for instance, had reached LL296,200, after starting the month at LL206,400.
The next category of spending with the highest rate of inflation was food and non-alcoholic beverages, which rose 303.66 percent year on year, roughly the same as the less-heavily-weighted restaurant and hotels category. Each of the categories saw a quadrupling of year on year prices.
Meanwhile prices at least tripled year on year for alcoholic beverages and tobacco, clothing and footwear, household utilities like water and electricity, and healthcare expenditures.
Of particular concern as October was back-to-school month for Lebanon’s public school students, the government documented a dramatic increase in the price of stationery and textbooks, which rose by 180.92 percent in just one month compared to September.