Media Statement                                                                                                                                                                     20 August 2018

Stats SA to make more detailed consumer price index (CPI) data available

In line with the emerging international trends to make as much data available to users as possible, Statistics South Africa (Stats SA) will provide additional data on the consumer price index from this month.

Time series indices will be available at a further level of detail on the Stats SA website with effect from the July CPI release, to be published on 22 August. The new time series will be made available together with the existing publication-level time series and will start with indices from January 2017, which is the beginning of the current basket and weights period.

The additional data will enhance the transparency of the CPI and provide users with additional information for analysis of price trends in specific products. Understanding the pass through of VAT and other tax increases is a possible application.

Stats SA currently makes CPI data available every month in two formats:

• the main statistical release and the CPI Additional tables which contains indices for the total country, rural areas, provinces and selected components of the CPI.
• the time series data, which has the same level of detail as the statistical releases and which are published on the website in Excel and ASCII formats. This file is available from: https://www.statssa.gov.za/?page_id=1847.

The CPI is calculated at five levels of aggregation according to the Classification of Individual Consumption by Purpose (COICOP). Table 1 below gives two illustrations of the levels. Currently, data are made available at the group (4-digit) level for food products (e.g. Bread and cereals) and at the class (3- digit) level for most other products (e.g. Purchase of vehicles).

The new time series indices will be available at a further level of detail than currently available, namely indicator product (8-digit level) level for food products and product (5-digit) level for most other products. They can be accessed from the same site as the existing time series files.

Table 1. COICOP hierarchy

For further information, please contact:

Patrick Kelly

patrickke@statssa.gov.za

012 310 8290

082 888 2248

or

Marietjie Bennett

marietjieb@statssa.gov.za

012 310 8077

082 888 2194