Business | Economy
Iran's annual inflation rate jumps to 27.6% in August
Iran's annual inflation rate jumped by 1.5 percentage points to 27.6 per cent in August compared with the previous month, the central bank said.
- Reuters
- Published: 23:12 September 5, 2008
- Shops have plenty of fruit in Tajrish, a north Tehran suburb. The central bank said that consumer prices rose by 1.8 per cent in the Iranian month that ended on August 21.
- Image Credit: Bloomberg News
Tehran: Iran's annual inflation rate jumped by 1.5 percentage points to 27.6 per cent in August compared with the previous month, the central bank said.
Rising prices and the government's economic management in the world's fourth-largest oil producer are likely to be a major battleground in next year's election when President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is expected to run for a new term.
The central bank said on its website www.cbi.ir that consumer prices rose by 1.8 per cent in the Iranian month that ended on August 21, pushing up the year-on-year rate to 27.6 per cent.
Iran's inflation rate was about 12 per cent in mid-2005, when the conservative president came to power pledging to share out the country's oil wealth more fairly.
Global problem
Critics say profligate spending of petrodollars, combined with interest rates well below inflation, has further fuelled price pressures.
Ahmadinejad has dismissed the criticism saying rising inflation is a global problem and that his government is tackling the issue.
Iran has reaped windfall gains in recent years from the high oil price on world markets and says its economy grows by more than 6 per cent annually, despite tightening international sanctions on Tehran over its disputed nuclear plans.
Analysts, however, say the nuclear standoff is making foreign firms more wary of investing in the Islamic Republic.
Some independent econ-omists put inflation several percentage points higher than the central bank's rate, a figure they say is based on a basket of goods that does not accurately reflect the items that most ordinary Iranians buy.
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