The government’s inflation target for this year will remain unchanged despite the higher than expected rate of increase in consumer prices in January, the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) said.

Acting Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Karl Kendrick T. Chua said that measures to taper the accelerating inflation are in place to ensure the economic managers’ full-year target of 2.0 percent to 4.0 percent average rate will be achieved.

The Philippine Statistics Authority reported last Friday that the country’s headline inflation rate accelerated to 4.2 percent last month, the fastest recorded since the 4.4 percent in January 2019.

The faster inflation was mainly driven by the increase in the price of food items, particularly meat and vegetables, Chua noted.

Food inflation accelerated to 6.6 percent, while non-food inflation remained unchanged from the previous month at 2.3 percent. Meanwhile, faster price adjustments were also recorded in restaurants, miscellaneous goods and services, and transport.

Chua said the rising food inflation can be attributed to the outbreaks of African Swine Fever (ASF), and the additional logistics and transportation costs of sourcing pork to augment supplies throughout the country.

Likewise, the closed fishing season across several regions, and the damage in the countryside from typhoons and floods last year pushed up inflation during the month, the NEDA official said.

“Our priority right now is to ensure that food supply is adequate so that households affected by COVID-19 and the quarantines will not be doubly affected by the increase in food prices,” Chua said in a statement.

In the interim, Chua said allowing more importation of key agricultural products, while adhering to strict safety protocols to prevent entry of contaminated products, will help augment supply and manage inflation.

The Committee on Tariff and Related Matters earlier endorsed the proposed increase in the minimum access volume (MAV) of pork and the temporary decrease in the most favored nation (MFN) tariff rates of pork and rice.

“All these can increase the food supply and stabilize food prices,” he said.

The Department of Agriculture is also implementing a four-pronged approach to increase swine supply through heightened swine production in the identified ASF-free areas.

Chua said NEDA supports the Department of Agriculture’s proposal to increase the MAV allocation for pork imports and implement “special hog lanes’” or food highways in coordination with the Department of Interior and Local Government.

“These measures will help boost domestic supply and ensure the unhampered delivery of agricultural products across the country,” Chu said.

Nevertheless, Chua noted that overall inflation remains manageable, saying “we continue to reap the benefits of the Rice Tariffication Law."

“We passed the Rice Tariffication Law to address the rice shortage and related price hikes last 2018. As a result, rice prices decreased by around 10 pesos per kilo from its peak,” he said.

In January, rice inflation was at only 0.1 percent.

"Just like before, the government continues to be proactive in addressing spikes in inflation as this affects the poor the most,” the NEDA chief affirmed.