Zimbabwe’s monthly inflation rate climbed to 0.1 percent in March from -1.6 percent the previous month, the Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency (ZIMSTAT) said Friday.
Last month’s inflation slipped into negative territory for the first time in many years following the sustained implementation of a tight monetary and fiscal stance by the authorities.
According to the ZIMSTAT, annual inflation for March declined to 87.6 percent from 92.3 percent the previous month.
Last month, Zimbabwe started to compute the inflation rate using a weighted average based on the use of Zimbabwean dollars and United States dollars.
The Zimbabwean economy has a dual currency structure composed of the Zimbabwean dollar and the U.S. dollar, with the use of the U.S. dollar currently dominant and constituting about 70 percent of domestic transactions.
Zimbabwe’s monthly and annual inflation has progressively declined from peak levels of 30.7 percent in June and 285 percent in August last year, respectively, following a tight monetary and fiscal policy stance by the government.
The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, the country’s central bank, envisages annual inflation to progressively decline to between 10 percent and 30 percent by year-end. Enditem
