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Cristina Vallejo
Malaga
Friday, 13 September 2024, 11:27
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Malaga province has been able to control the upward trend in shopping basket prices better than Spain as a whole. This has been the case for around a year now with the rise in food and non-alcoholic beverages being more contained in the province than in the country as a whole. Moreover, according to data from the INE national statistics institute published this Thursday, this dynamic was confirmed once again for the month of August. Filling a shopping basket with the basics in the supermarket is now 2.1% more expensive than a year ago in Malaga, while in Spain as a whole the increase is 2.5%, four tenths of a percentage point higher. In summary, food inflation continues upwards, albeit at a lower rate in Malaga.
In July, prices for the basics rose at a rate of 2.9% in Malaga, which means that the easing of prices from one month to the next has been no less than eight tenths of a percentage point to the current 2.1%. Meanwhile, across Spain prices have only eased by six tenths (from 3.1% in July to 2.5% in August).
This 2.1% rise in food and non-alcoholic beverages in Malaga is the lowest since September 2021, after an 18-month trail of rates rising above 10% between April 2022 and September 2023.
Furthermore, if we break down the components, we can see that it is mainly foodstuffs that have pulled down the increase in the cost of filling the fridge and larder: their rise is 1.8%, compared with the 4.4% rise recorded for non-alcoholic beverages.
This slowdown in price increases for the most basic goods has made it possible for the general CPI (the consumer price index that includes, in addition to food and non-alcoholic beverages, the rest of the goods and services most consumed by Spanish households) in Malaga to fall from 3.4% to 2.6% from one month to the next. Meanwhile, in Spain the drop has been more modest: from 2.8% in July to 2.3% in August.
2.6% is the general CPI for Malaga
It has eased from 3.4% a month earlier, but compares poorly with the average of 2.3% for Spain as a whole.
All in all, the overall inflation figure - the movement in prices as a whole - in the province is not only above the Spanish average, but also among the highest in Spain. The 2.6% recorded in the province is only below the 2.9% recorded in Vizcaya and the 2.7% recorded in Las Palmas, and ties with the figure for Guipúzcoa. Also, therefore, the rise in prices in this province is the highest in Andalucía, followed by that recorded in Jaen (2.4%). Moreover, it is no less than one percentage point behind Cadiz and Almeria, where inflation in August stood at 1.6%. In Andalucía as a whole prices were 2.1% higher last month than twelve months earlier. Only in Cantabria, Castilla y León, Castilla-La Mancha and Murcia (2%) did prices rise less than in Andalucía.
So where is the reason as to why inflation in Malaga is higher than in Spain and among the highest in the country? There are different causes. One of the most important of these is housing, the affordability of which is a growing problem for residents of Malaga city and the province as a whole. Thus, the component of the CPI that makes up housing and its supplies recorded a year-on-year rise of 8.4% in the province, compared with 7.6% a month earlier. In contrast, in the country as a whole the increase in this component was 4% (compared with 3.2% in July). If we break it down further, it can firstly be seen that housing rentals have risen by 4.1% year-on-year in the province compared with 2.2% in the country as a whole. Next is the water supply cost and other related services that have increased by 14.5% year-on-year in Malaga compared with 3% nationally. Lastly, electricity, gas and other fuels rose by 7.6% in the province but only by 5.5% in the country as a whole.
The second group of goods and services that marks the difference between Malaga and Spain as a whole stems from the hotel and hospitality trades. In Malaga province prices rose by 5.2% in August compared to a year earlier, mainly due to restaurants increasing their prices rather than hotels, which also represents an increase of one tenth of a percentage point compared to July. In contrast, at national level prices have eased by one tenth of a percentage point from one month to the next, to register a year-on-year increase of 4.6% in August.
So, restaurants across Malaga are the main contributors to the rise in prices of the component that they make up together with hotels. However, prices have increased across the board, just less so in the hotel sector: eating out has gone up by 5.2% year-on-year average in Malaga compared to 4.5% nationally, but accommodation services have also increased by 3.6%, considerably less than the 5.7% registered in Spain as a whole.
Alcoholic beverages have also recorded a higher rise in Malaga (2.3%) than at national level (1.4%). The same is true of leisure and culture, which in the province have risen at a year-on-year rate of 2.7% (2.2% in July), compared with 2% nationally.
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