Prices of 26 commodities including tomatoes, wheat, poultry and some fruits increased in January as compared to December 2012. Seventeen commodities experienced price cuts while nine registered no change. FAFEN monitors who visited 195 retail outlets in 111 districts reported a high rise in the price of tomatoes, 42%. However, a decrease was registered for onions (11%) and potatoes (8%). Poultry products also observed an increase as prices of broiler chicken live and broiler chicken meat went up by 19% each, and farm eggs by 7%.
The price of wheat flour was 11% higher and that of wheat grain, 8%. Seasonal commodities like peanuts and kinnow experienced an increase of 13% and 9%, respectively. Prices of other fruits including golden apple (2%) and red apples (1%) also went up. Region-wise analysis shows that the price of tomatoes registered high increases in all regions except ICT, where the highest price increase was observed for a plate of beef. The maximum price decrease in KP and Sindh was registered for onions while Punjab observed the highest drop in price of potatoes. Balochistan reported the greatest cut in the price of fresh milk and ICT and FATA observed the same for spices and condiments.
Comparing with the data collected by PBS on January 10, 2013, FAFEN Governance Monitors observed higher prices of fewer commodities as compared with the PBS in seven districts – Rawalpindi, Lahore, Faisalabad, Multan, Hyderabad, Peshawar and Quetta. However, in five districts (Gujranwala, Sialkot, Karachi, Bahawalpur and Khuzdar), the PBS observed higher prices of fewer items than those observed by FAFEN.
