Qatar's industrial producers' price pressure continues to ease in June: PSA

Qatar's producers' price index (PPI), which captures the price pressure felt by the producers of goods and services, eased this May on both annualised and monthly basis, according to the official estimates.
The country's PPI plummeted 31.33% year-on-year owing to a noticeable decline in the indices of hydrocarbons and certain manufactured products such as chemicals, refined petroleum products and basic metals, according to the figures released by the Planning and Statistics Authority (PSA).
The PPI saw a 3.24% contraction month-on-month in June 2023 on hydrocarbons as well as refined petroleum products, chemicals and rubber and plastics products.
The PPI measures inflation from the perspective of costs to industry or producers of products as it measures price changes before they reach consumers.
The PSA had released a new PPI series in late 2015. With a base of 2013, it draws on an updated sampling frame and new weights. The previous sampling frame dates from 2006, when the Qatari economy was much smaller than today and the range of products made domestically much narrower.
The lower expectations on global inflation and its appurtenant reaction within the central banks expect to scale back the pace of interest rate increases, which is expected to get reflected in the industrial PPI.
The mining PPI, which carries the maximum weight of 82.46%, reported a 31.42% plunge on an annualised basis in June 2023 owing to 31.46% shrinkage in the index of crude petroleum and natural gas and 0.28% in other mining and quarrying segments.
The mining sector PPI had seen a 3.05% dip month-on-month in June 2023 as the index of crude petroleum and natural gas was seen plummeting 3.05%, while that of other mining and quarrying segments was flat.
The manufacturing sector PPI, which has a weight of 15.85% in the basket, tanked 33.54% on a yearly basis in June 2023 due to a 41.13% decline in the index of chemicals and chemical products, 33.15% in refined petroleum products, 23.54% in basic metals, 1.26% in cement and other non-metallic mineral products, 0.84% in printing and reproduction of recorded media, and 0.29% in rubber and plastics products. Nevertheless, there was a 4.11% surge in the index of food products and 1.82% in beverages in the review period.
The manufacturing PPI shrank 4.43% on a monthly basis in June 2023 on account of a 5.34% decrease in the index of chemicals and chemical products, 4.58% in refined petroleum products, 4.22% in basic metals, 3.92% in rubber and plastics products, 1.02% in cement and other non-metallic mineral products, and 0.16% in beverages; even as there was a 0.18% jump in the index of food products.
The index of electricity, gas, steam, and air conditioning supply - which has a weight of 1.16% in the PPI basket - reported a 0.39% rise on a yearly basis but fell 3.6% month-on-month this June.
The index of water supply - which has weight of 0.53% in the PPI, was seen expanding 18.02% year-on-year but was down 0.44% month-on-month in June 2023.