31 May 2022
Eurostat has today (31 May 2022) published flash estimates of inflation from the EU Harmonised Index of Consumer Prices (HICP) for the Eurozone for May 2022, including estimates for Ireland which have been compiled by the Central Statistics Office (CSO).
Commenting on the data published today, Colin Cotter, Statistician in the Prices Division, said: “The latest flash estimate of the Harmonised Index of Consumer Prices (HICP), compiled by the CSO, indicates that prices for consumer goods and services in Ireland are estimated to have increased by 8.2% in the past year. The corresponding rate for the Eurozone published by Eurostat today was 8.1%. These flash estimates are subject to revision when the final HICP results are published next month (See Editor’s Note below).
Six of the 19 Eurozone countries had a lower annual increase than the estimate of 8.2% for Ireland while 12 countries had higher rates. Estonia had the highest estimated annual inflation at 20.1% while Malta had the lowest at 5.6%.
Looking at the components of the flash HICP in Ireland for May 2022, Energy is estimated to be up 6.7% in the month and up 46.2% since May 2021. For the Eurozone overall, energy prices were up by 2.0% in the month and up by 39.2% on an annual basis."
The Consumer Price Index (CPI) is the official measure of inflation for Ireland and is published monthly by the CSO. The CPI release for May 2022 will be published on 09 June 2022. The HICP is an index of consumer prices that has been harmonised to allow comparisons across Eurozone countries. While the final HICP results for the Eurozone are usually published by Eurostat around the middle of the month following the reference month, flash estimates are issued around the end of each reference month.
This is the link to the May 2022 Eurozone flash HICP estimates published by Eurostat this morning: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/2995521/14636256/2-31052022-AP-EN.pdf/3ba84e21-80e6-fc2f-6354-2b83b1ec5d35?t=1653913778479
The flash estimates of HICP have been published for some countries within the Eurozone by Eurostat each month since January 2019. Ireland was included in the publication of the country breakdowns of the flash estimates process since November 2019.
The final results of the HICP for Ireland for May 2022 will be published as part of the CPI release at 11am on 09 June 2022 while Eurostat are expected to publish final HICP results for the Eurozone for May 2022 at 10am on 17 June 2022.
Please note that these flash HICP estimates are subject to revision when the final results are published. For 18 of the 30 months since November 2019 when the CSO’s flash estimate has been published by Eurostat, there was no difference between Ireland’s flash estimate and final result of the HICP. There was a difference of 0.1 percentage points for 10 of the months while one month in 2020 had a difference of 0.2 percentage points and another had a difference of 0.3 percentage points.
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