Turkey, new data shows inflation reached 80%
Turkey’s official inflation rate increased to almost 80% last month, the highest in 25 years!
as President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s unconventional economic policies continued to drive up the cost of living.
The growth in annual prices rose from 73.5% in May to 78.8% in June, according to the Turkish statistics agency.
*FT On Turkish inflation
Turkish inflation reached almost 80% as analysts warned that the country risks getting trapped in a spiral of rising prices and wages https://t.co/cfGefZY8wT
— Financial Times (@FinancialTimes) July 4, 2022
Erdoğan has claimed that Turkey’s problem is not inflation. “We do not have an inflation problem. We have a cost of living problem,” he said last month.
Opposition parties and economists said recent hikes in oil and gas prices meant the real rate of inflation was almost double the official figure.
A monthly report release by Turkey’s ENAG group of independent economists showed consumer prices had risen by 175% in June, compared with a year earlier.
ENAG said prices had risen by 71.4% since the start of 2022.
The Istanbul chamber of commerce said inflation in Turkey‘s largest city had reached an annual rate of 95%.
Prices in Turkey are rising at their fastest rate in over 30 years, according to the latest official figures.
Transport costs and housing saw some of the sharpest price rises, worsened by the Ukraine war.
Inflation has surged since last year, when the Turkish president cut interest rates to try to boost the economy.
Usually countries would increase interest rates in an attempt to cool inflation.
In the latest inflation figures,
- transportation saw the biggest rise in costs, climbing 123% over the past year.
- Food and non-alcoholic beverages were close behind with price rises of 94%, while,
- the cost of furnishings and household equipment was up 81%.
The overall inflation figure was the highest since 1998, when annual inflation hit 80.4%
