Palace says steady inflation rate in October is ‘good news’

“The fact that it did not go up should be a good news,” Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo said on Tuesday after it was reported that inflation in October stayed at 6.7 percent.

Panelo stressed that the October inflation reflects the government’s efforts to tame the soaring prices of commodities.

“Considering the directives of the President, supplying us with food and other measures undertaken by the Department of Finance, as well as agriculture and trade, I think that contributes (in taming inflation),” Panelo said in a Palace briefing.

President Duterte recently issued orders aimed at easing importation of food products to boost supply and bring down prices.

Although the rate of increase in prices was the same as last September, National Statistician Lisa Grace S. Bersales said “there seems to be a slowing in (the) increase of prices” since the month-on-month increase in prices of basic commodities further eased to 0.3 percent last month from September’s 0.8 percent. /ee

READ: October inflation up 6.7%, still over 9-year high, but price pressures easing