• This means that on average, prices of goods and services increased by 9.8 percent.
• Monthly inflation declined to 0.3%
• Zambia recorded a trade surplus of K3.7 billion in July 2022.

Zambia Statistics Agency (ZAMSTATS) has revealed a drop in Annual Inflation for the Month of August 2022 to 9.8% from 9.9 % recorded in July 2022.

ZAMSTATS Interim Statistician General Mulenga Musepa during a Monthly dissemination bulletin meeting said the drop in inflation was attributed to food Items with Annual food inflation slowing to 11.3% from 12 % recorded in July 2022 under items such as Meat Fruits, Rice local and Eggs.

Mr. Musepa however noted the Annual Non-food inflation has increased to 7.8% from 7.2% in July 2022.

He said overall monthly inflation declined to 0.3% in August 2022 on a 0.4 % increase from 0.4 % in non-food items such as Vegetables and Dried Bream and a 0.1 % decline from 0.7 on Fuels and Lubricants as well as passenger Transport by road.

“Annual inflation for August 2022 decreased to 9.8 percent from 9.9 percent recorded in July 2022. This means that on average, prices of goods and services increased by 9.8 percent between August 2021 and August 2022. The slowdown in annual inflation was mainly attributed to price movements in food items” He explained further.

Meanwhile Mr. Musepa indicated that Zambia recorded a trade surplus of K3.7 billion in July 2022 compared to a surplus of K2.1 billion in June 2022 indicating a 73 percent increase.

He said exports mainly comprising domestically produced goods, decreased by 1.7 percent to K15.9 billion from K16.2 billion during the period under review mainly on account of a 3.5 percent decrease in export earnings from Intermediate goods.

Mr. Musepa noted imports decreased by 13.1 percent to K12.2 billion from K14.1 billion as a result of decreases in import bills of Consumer goods, Capital goods and Intermediate goods of 25.2, 22.5 and 7.1 percent, respectively.

He added that, “The cumulative Total trade for the period January to July 2022 was K204.7 billion while that of 2021 for the same period was K215.0 billion, representing a 4.8 percent decrease.”