The very slight increase in July’s Consumer Price Index (CPI) is attributed to the government and local authorities’ efforts to curb inflation, reports the General Statistics Office (GSO).

According to the GSO, July’s CPI is estimated to have risen by only 0.06 percent over last month, much lower than the earlier forecasts of 0.2-0.3 percent and is the lowest monthly CPI growth in a past year.

The government’s policies to stabilise prices have started to pay off in recent months driving July’s CPI growth to a record low, said the GSO, citing the gradual decrease in the CPI, from 1.35 percent in the first quarter to 0.21 percent in the second quarter and to 0.44 percent in the third quarter.

As inflation has climbed to 4.84 percent so far this year, the government has called for a greater effort to keep the rate of inflation under 8 percent.

The Ministry of Planning and Investment (MPI) predicts that the CPI in August will continue to increase slightly and inflation for the whole year will be kept below the target.

As the economy is still to make a full recovery and people’s incomes have not improved much, a rise in the prices of essential goods items will have a considerable impact on people’s lives,

In addition, there are other factors emerging from the world’s economic recovery that may affect input costs while natural disasters are likely to drive prices of essential goods up.

Therefore, according to the GSO, central government and local authorities should be well prepared to take flexible measures and give top priority to stabilising exchange rates and ensuring the market’s liquidity. – VOV