The Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) has released Consumer Price Indices (CPI) and rates of inflation for the month of May 2012. KNBS generates the numbers using data collected during the second and third weeks of every month under review to get the CPI.

The CPI increased by 0.26 % from 133.74 in April 2012 to 134.09 in May 2012. The overall inflation rate however, reduced from 13.06% in April to stand at 12.22% in May 2012.

Food and Non Alcoholic drinks’ index fell by 0.18 per cent between April 2012 and May 2012. The decrease was mainly due to falls in prices of some food products such as sukuma wiki, cabbages, spinach, onions and oranges in May compared to April 2012. There was  significant rises in the prices of maize flour, maize grain and wheat flour among other food items over the same period.

The price increases were however outweighed by the decreases and the resultant overall food index was lower than it was in April. The prices of energy fuels however showed a downward trend with electricity and cooking gas prices declining by 6.0% cent and 0.4% respectively. The prices of firewood, charcoal and house rents went up by slight margins compared to how it was in April.