Tuesday, February 14, 2023 | 1:00 a.m.
The National Institute of Statistics and Censuses (Indec) will announce today the evolution of the Consumer Price Index (CPI) during January, after it marked a 5.1% rise in December.
According to private estimates, reflected in the Survey of Market Expectations (REM) carried out by the Central Bank, inflation in January was around 5.6%.
The new numbers would have been influenced by the prices of seasonal products and services, such as hotels and gastronomy, driven by the new summer season, to which items such as transportation and prepaid medicine, among others, were added.
The increase in the price of meat, which was seen from the second half of the month, also had an impact in January, together with that of some fresh foods.
The government wants the price index this year to be around 60%, after having accumulated a rise of 94.8% in 2022.
For this, it carries out a series of price agreements with food, hygiene and cleaning companies, as well as with private education institutes.
The government accepted the increase
The Secretary of Productive Development Industry, José Ignacio de Mendiguren, has already announced that inflation in January “will be higher” than in December, mainly due to increases due to the tourist movement.
“Yes, unfortunately we see that the figure (inflation for January) is above that of the previous month. That worries us,” De Mendiguren admitted in a dialogue with AM 750 radio. The official explained that this inflationary increase is due both to “seasonal problems” and to the fact that “during the season there was an important movement of record tourism and when this happens it price abuse.”
In this way, the official dependent on the Ministry of Economy recognized that the price increase will be high.
“Inflation is the most worrying thing. The stabilization plan of this government, unlike the previous ones, continues to call joint meetings. Inflation in July last year gave a projection of 140%. We were able to download it, ”added De Mendiguren along the same lines, in another interview that he gave to El Destape.
“We have two problems: inputs and inflation. If the real salary loses again with inflation, there is no model that is sustainable”, she affirmed, adding that “there is a complicated structural inflation. The world goes to the highest structural inflation since the Second World War”.
“Inflation has a lot of content. Massa speaks of a path of fiscal order. We believe we reward growth,” she highlighted. The secretary also pointed against the concentrated sectors that seek a devaluation, with the consequence that this would have in rising prices.
“I don’t want it to sound like an excuse, but here there are many people with important capitals who have bet on a sharp devaluation since August. And today a country that fails to accumulate enough reserves is very vulnerable. Any bullfight that four people put together destabilizes”. In this sense, he recognized that the combination of not having reserves, inflation and “real wage liquefaction” is “terrible.”
On the other hand, De Mendiguren pointed out the statement of Together for Change, which stated that the current public debt represents a “time bomb” for the government. “If there are people who know about bombs, they are from Together for Change: they did it in 2001 and 2019,” he said.
