{"id":389544,"date":"2026-04-21T00:03:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-21T00:03:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/389544\/"},"modified":"2026-04-21T00:03:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-21T00:03:08","slug":"consumers-price-index-inflation-rate-remains-at-3-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/389544\/","title":{"rendered":"Consumers Price Index inflation rate remains at 3.1%"},"content":{"rendered":"\u201cHigher electricity prices accounted for more than a tenth of the 3.1% annual increase,\u201d prices and deflators spokeswoman Nicola Growden said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis was the third quarter in a row that electricity was the largest upwards contributor to the annual inflation rate.\u201d<\/p>\n
Other notable contributors were local authority rates and payments which were up 8.8%, meat and poultry (up 8.6%), rent (up 1.2%) and petrol (up 1.1%).<\/p>\n
Inflation for the March quarter was 0.9% up from 0.6% in the December quarter.<\/p>\n
Higher petrol prices were the largest contributor to quarterly inflation \u2013 up 3.5%.<\/p>\n
While petrol prices were down in January and February, they rose in March after the start of the Middle East conflict effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz.<\/p>\n
\u201cPetrol is the third-largest expense item for New Zealand households after rent and construction,\u201d Growden said.<\/p>\n
It accounts for 3.5% of typical household spending.<\/p>\n
A rise in pharmaceutical prices also drove inflation with prices up 17.7% on the back of prescription charge increases.<\/p>\n
Combined petrol and pharmaceutical products accounted for more than a quarter of the 0.9% increase.<\/p>\n
Confectionery, nuts, fruit and electricity also contributed to the inflation rise in the quarter. <\/p>\n
But international air transport was down 7%. <\/p>\n
\u201cAirfares to Europe, Australia, and the Pacific Islands drove the fall in international airfare prices in the March 2026 quarter,\u201d Growden said. <\/p>\n
Economists had expected the annual rate to land between 2.8% and 3.1%, effectively marking a low point before the oil shock fully took effect. <\/p>\n
From here, many bank economists are picking the inflation rate to head to around 4%.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis quarter\u2019s result was really just the curtain raiser,\u201d Westpac senior economist Satish Ranchhod said.<\/p>\n
\u201cBoth we and the RBNZ now expect inflation will rise to over 4% in the June quarter.\u201d<\/p>\n
Westpac assumed annual inflation would peak at 4.3% in the June quarter, before dropping back to 3.9% by the end of this year.<\/p>\n
\u201cToday\u2019s result suggests upside risk to those forecasts,\u201d Ranchhod said.<\/p>\n
The middle part of the year would see the full brunt of the recent rise in oil prices, as well as related increases in transport and other costs, he said.<\/p>\n
While the \u201ccosmetics\u201d didn\u2019t look great, core inflation was largely contained, ANZ senior economist Miles Workman said.<\/p>\n
Inflation excluding food and energy accelerated 0.1 percentage point to 2.6%.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut that\u2019s about where the \u2018hawkish\u2019 take on these data stops,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cOther measures of core inflation fell in the quarter.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tradeable inflation (largely determined by global factors, including movements in the NZD) slowed just 0.1 points to 2.5% for the year, stronger than ANZ\u2019s expectation of 2.2%, he said.<\/p>\n
Non-tradeable inflation (driven largely by domestic factors) was unchanged at 3.5% annually, slightly above ANZ and the RBNZ\u2019s February MPS forecast of 3.4%.<\/p>\n
Liam Dann is business editor-at-large for the New Zealand Herald. He is a senior writer and columnist, and also presents and produces videos and podcasts. He joined the Herald in 2003.<\/p>\n
Stay ahead with the latest market moves, corporate updates, and economic insights by subscribing to our Business newsletter<\/a> \u2013 your essential weekly round-up of all the business news you need.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cHigher electricity prices accounted for more than a tenth of the 3.1% annual increase,\u201d prices and deflators spokeswoman…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":389545,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[2246,39725,3225,1975,138,23852,219,30271,4493,13986,1943,1535,3234,111,139,69,3333,13420,19257,13181,10715,13421,1865,2963],"class_list":{"0":"post-389544","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-economy","8":"tag-2246","9":"tag-39725","10":"tag-according","11":"tag-at","12":"tag-business","13":"tag-consumers","14":"tag-economy","15":"tag-figures","16":"tag-increased","17":"tag-index","18":"tag-inflation","19":"tag-march","20":"tag-months","21":"tag-new-zealand","22":"tag-newzealand","23":"tag-nz","24":"tag-price","25":"tag-quarter","26":"tag-rate","27":"tag-released","28":"tag-remains","29":"tag-stats","30":"tag-today","31":"tag-zealands"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389544","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=389544"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389544\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/389545"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=389544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=389544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=389544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}