JAKARTA: Indonesia’s consumer price index accelerated at a faster pace in June as food prices picked up during Islamic holy month of Ramadhan.
The national statistic bureau announced on Friday that annual inflation rose 3.49 percent in June from 3.33 percent in May.
On month, inflation also increased by 0.66 percent last month, compared with 0.24 percent in the previous months, Suryamin, head of the bureau, told a press conference at the bureau headquarters.
Annual core inflation, excluding volatile food and administered prices, increased by 3.49 percent in June from 3.41 percent in May, he disclosed.
Demand of foods and transport cost regularly rises during fasting month ended by Islamic festivity of Eid-al-Fitr in the world’s largest Muslim country.
Indonesia’s central bank, which has adopted the reverse repo rate as a new policy for its benchmark interest rate beginning August this year, targets 2016 inflation to stay between 3-5 percent.
The lender aims to support the government effort to spur GDP growth at 5 to 5.4 percent this year, faster than 4.79 last year.
The central bank has more rooms to continue easing policy in coming months as the potential of the U.S. Fed reserve to rise rate in coming months becomes smaller after the exit of the United Kingdom from the European group.
The lender aggressively cut its basic rate by 25 basis points to 6.5 percent in June after a two-month pause in April and May.
