The National Extended Consumer Price Index - 15 (IPCA-15) changed 0.51% in April, very close to March’s rate (0.49%). With that result, the cumulative indicator in 2013 is at 2.58%, well above the rate of 1.87% relative to the same period in 2012. Considering the last 12 months, the index is at 6.51%, also above the immediately previous 12 months (6.43%). In March 2012 the rate was at 0.43%. The complete publication of IPCA-15 can be accessed at https://www.ibge.gov.br/english/estatistica/indicadores/precos/ipca15/defaultipca15.shtm

Domestic workers and tomatoes were the major individual influences on the index this month, each one contributing with 0.05 percentage points. Even though led by tomatoes, whose price change rose from 9.99% to 16.62%, the rate for Food and Beverages decelerated from 1.40% in March to 1.00% in April. Though with a smaller growth, this group registered the highest rate for a group this month, according to the following table:

The food products that recorded the smallest pace of price growth were carrots (from 24.29% in March to 7.62% in April), carioca beans (from 11.68% to 7.28%), black beans (from 2.31% to 0.31%) and cassava flour (from 5.72% to 3.44%). Furthermore, some items registered a drop this month, like soybean oil (from -0.96% to -3.39%), meat (from -0.62% to -2.58%) and pullet (from 1.80% to -2.04%).

As to the item domestic workers (from 1.53% in March to 1.25% in April), the smaller change in prices led the group of Personal Expenses (from 0.51% to 0.48%) to record a lower figure than that of the previous month.

All in all, the IPCA-15 in April shows that some important items in the budget of households decelerated the rate of price growth, whereas other items grew even more, leading to similar rates in the two months.

Concerning the items whose figures declined from one month to the other, the highlights in addition to domestic workers were ethanol (from 3.89% to 1.35%), condominium maintenance fees (from 0.62% to 0.51%), gasoline (from 2.34% to -0.20%), used cars (from 0.37% to -0.24%), landline telephone (from 0.38% to -0.38%) and others.

As to those items that registered more significant changes in April than in March, the highlights were residential rent (from 0.34% to 0.83%), car repair (from 0.34% to 1.53%), manpower (from 0.27% to 1.24%), urban bus fares (from -0.08% to 0.45%), hotel (from -0.80% to 2.69%), water and sewage fees (from 0.44% to 0.88%), medicines (from 0.11% to 0.93%) and others. By changing from -16.41% to -9.20%, airline fares exerted a smaller influence.

Non-food products changed 0.35% in April, above the change in March (0.20%).

Among the regional indexes, the highest one was recorded in Brasília (0.74%), mainly due to the rise of 1.70% in the prices of food and of water and sewage fees (4.55%). Porto Alegre (0.27%) posted the smallest index this month. The next table shows the monthly figures by region surveyed:

In order to estimate the IPCA-15, the prices collected from March 15 to April 12 were compared with those in force from February 15 to March 14.  The indicator refers to families with monthly income of one to forty minimum wages and it encompasses the metropolitan regions of Rio de Janeiro, Porto Alegre, Belo Horizonte, Recife, São Paulo, Belém, Fortaleza, Salvador, Curitiba, and also Brasília and Goiânia. The methodology is the same as the one used for IPCA; the difference lies in the period of price collection.