“The month-on-month change in the producer price index between February 2017 and March 2017 was 1.4 per cent,” Mr Baah Wadieh, the Acting Government Statistician, said at a press conference, on Wednesday.Mr Wadieh explained that the rise in the rate was mainly due to higher petroleum and gold prices.The producer price inflation in the Mining and Quarrying sub-sector increased by 1.1 percentage points to 20.8 per cent in March up from 19.7 per cent in February.

The Manufacturing sub-sector, which accounts for two-thirds of total industry, saw producer inflation up 0.5 percentage points to 4.0 per cent.The Utilities sub-sector recorded a year-on-year producer price inflation rate of 1.5 per cent, an increase of 0.2 percentage points over the February rate.

The producer inflation rate in the petroleum sub-sector jumped to 5.3 per cent in March from 0.4 per cent in February.