Industrial inflation drops in October

The annual rate of industrial inflation fell in October, according the figures from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) today.

Factory gate prices remained unchanged for October with the CSO’s overall manufacturing output price index at 131.1.

This gives an annual rate of wholesale inflation of -0.8 per cent compared with an annual increase of 0.2 per cent in September and 2.6 per cent in July last.

Contributing to the annual change were decreases in slaughtering, preparing and preserving of meat (-8.9 per cent), mineral oil refining and electrical engineering (-3.5 per cent) and increases in dairy products (+2.1 per cent), drink (+1.7 per cent) and grain milling, animal, and poultry foods (+4.8 per cent).

The CSO also noted home sales fell by 0.3 per cent and the index for export sales increased by 0.2 per cent in the month.

The figures also show building and construction material prices rose by 0.5 per cent in October 2001 and increased by 4.1 per cent in the year since October 2000.