Tanzania’s state-run National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said on Saturday that country's year-on-year inflation rate rose to 6.0% in January from 5.6% in December, 2013.
The prices rose 1.8% during January from 1.3 percent in December.
Reuters quotes analysts Haji Semboja (an economics professor at the University of Dar es Salaam) saying,
"The rise of the inflation rate is something that was expected due to an increase in power tariffs effectively from January this year," "The government's stated target of a 5 percent inflation rate by mid-2014 might not be realistic after all."
This, Semboja said, is expecting electricity tariffs to push consumer prices higher in coming months.
State-run power company, TANESCO, raised electricity tariffs by around 40% in January, citing rising costs of energy generation from oil-fired power turbines. Food and non-alcoholic beverage prices rose 6.0 percent for the year ended January 2014, the same rate as in December.
Ephraim Kwesigabo, a director at NBS told a news conference in Dar es Salaam told Reuters that: "The rise of the inflation rate is mainly attributed to a rise in the prices of non-food items such as power tariffs and cooking gas," "It's difficult to predict what will happen in the coming months ... the inflation rate could continue to rise or it could decline if the government takes appropriate steps to curb consumer prices."
