HCMC – The Consumer Price Index (CPI) in HCMC this month inched up 4.5% on average in the year’s first quarter, according to the city’s Statistics Office.

Among the 11 groups of consumer goods and services in the basket of items used to calculate the CPI, two groups registered a decline in prices, namely postal and telecom services (down 0.31%) and transport services (down 1.27%).

Among the remaining nine groups, educational services posted the highest increase, over 15%, as the policy that aims to ease people’s difficulties during the Covid-19 pandemic by supporting tuition fees had ended.

Cultural, entertainment and tourism services marked an average rise of 6.46%, followed by increases in prices of housing and construction materials (5.78%) and food and catering services (4.67%).

Meanwhile, the country’s CPI this quarter jumped up 4.18% against the same period in 2022, with core inflation rising 5.01%, according to the General Statistics Office.