Rio, January 21, 2004 (Agência Brasil - ABr) - Inflation in terms of the Weekly Consumer Price Index (IPC-S), as measured by the Getúlio Vargas Foundation (FGV) between December 13 and January 12, was 0.66%, 0.29% higher than the rate announced last week. According to the FGV's economsts, the categories of Food and Education, Reading Materials, and Entertainment, with a combined effect of 0.45%, were responsible for around 70% of the retail inflation registered by the IPC-S for the month-long period. They explained that, since most of this effect reflects seasonal influences, the exclusion of these categories from the calculation of the index would leave a variation of only 0.21%.

The economists found that, contrary to what was previously projected, deceleration in the Food group did not occur, due to significant increases in some of its components, such as vegetables and legumes, which rose 6.35%. Tomatoes rose 26.89% during the month. Nevertheless, despite the 0.55% increase compared with the last calculation, causing the figure to rise from 0.55% to 1.10%, there was deflation in seven items included in this group, the Foundation pointed out.

The greatest acceleration among the 7 areas of spending analyzed by the FGV was detected in the Education, Reading Materials, and Entertainment category, as was already expected, due to the purchase of school materials for the start of the school year, provoking an increase from 0.93%, in the previous study, to 1.74%.

Among the 12 capitals included in survey, 11 presented an acceleration in the rate of inflation. The largest was registered in Curitiba, in which the index rose 0.47%, to 0.81%. The only deceleration occurred in Belém, where the rate fell 0.01%. The lowest rate, however, was in São Paulo, 0.42%, and the highest, in Belém. (DAS)