AsemconnectVietnam - Vietnam's consumer price index (CPI) in August increased 0.88% month-on-month, fueled by higher prices of petroleum, rice and housing, according to the General Statistics Office (GSO).

Hanoi’s and HCMC’s CPI also increased in August of this year.
Vietnam’s CPI and inflation increased in the first eight months of 2023
In the first eight months of 2023, the CPI expanded 3.1% over the same period last year and the core inflation rose by 4.57%.
Among the 11 groups of goods and services used to calculate the CPI, 10 saw higher prices than the previous month while only the postal and telecommunications group experienced a price drop of 0.17%.
In the eight-month period, education rose by 7.28% year-on-year, contributing 0.45 percentage points to the overall CPI increase.
Housing and construction materials hiked by 6.65% over the same period last year, causing the overall CPI to surge by 1.25 percentage points. Meanwhile, the price of culture, entertainment and tourism services gained 3.18%.
Food items saw their prices climb 3.04%, mainly due to expansion in consumer demand during holidays and Lunar New Year (Tet), which caused the overall CPI to increase by 0.65 percentage points.
The price of electricity rose 3.99% and prices of other goods and services increased by 3.98% compared to the same period last year.
Meanwhile, in the first eight months of 2023, the price of kerosene decreased by 12.19% year-on-year; and that of domestic gasoline went down 17.56%.
HCM City’s CPI increased by 0.7% in August of 2023
Ho Chi Minh City’s consumer price index (CPI) rose by 0.7% in August, with eight out of the 11 groups of commodities and services witnessing an increase in prices, according to the municipal Statistics Office.
The office reported that transportation prices recorded the highest growth of 4.15%.
On the downward trend, the prices of post and telecommunications, culture and entertainment, and drugs and medical services decreased by 0.40%, 0.04%, and 0.02% compared to the previous month, respectively.
Gold price in August increased by 0.33%, while the price of US dollar rose by 0.51% compared to those in July.
According to the office, the CPI of the country's biggest city rose by 3.45% in the first eight months of 2023.
Hanoi's August CPI also increased
Hanoi’s consumer price index (CPI) in August rose 1.08% month on month, 1.6% from December 2022, and 0.78% from a year earlier, the municipal Statistics Office reported.
The eight-month CPI inched up 0.96% from the same period last year, it noted.
In August, the capital recorded month-on-month price hikes in 10 of the 11 categories of goods and services. Transport was up 3.74%, education 3.61%, housing, electricity, water, fuel and construction materials 0.9%, while food and catering services were up 0.69%. In other areas, beverages and cigarettes were up 0.33%, while apparel was up 0.28%. Culture, entertainment and tourism was up just 0.12%, while household equipment and appliances increased by 0.07% and medicine and health services did so by 0.02%. A measure of other goods and services revealed a slightly larger increase of 0.44%.
Postal and telecommunications services saw a decline of 0.39% from July.
Meanwhile, Hanoi has welcomed about 437,000 tourist arrivals in August, up 8.9% from the previous month and 62.3% year on year. They include an estimated 280,000 international visitors, rising 12.7% month on month and 2.3-fold year on year.
The number of tourist arrivals over the first eight months of the year totaled 3.06 million, surging 2.2-fold from the same period last year. That includes almost 2 million foreign arrivals, shooting up 4.2-fold from a year earlier, according to the Statistics Office.
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Source: VITIC/vietnamplus.vn