Consumer price index did not change in January compared to December

Goods were 6.5% and services 3.0% more expensive compared to January 2010.

Regulated prices of goods and services have risen by 6.2% and non-regulated prices by 4.9% compared to January of the previous year.

Compared to January of the previous year, the index was mainly influenced by the 11.4% price increase of food and non-alcoholic beverages, which gave a half of the total rise of the index and, of which, in turn, a half gave 18.4% more expensive dairy products and 11.9% more expensive cereals and a third 27% more expensive vegetables and 23% more expensive fresh fruit. The 6.1% price increase of electricity, heat energy and fuels and 12.7% price increase of motor fuel, which as a whole gave nearly a fourth of the total change, also had a bigger impact on the index. Compared to the same period a year ago, prices of apples and coffee have increased the most (47% and 41.2%, respectively). More than a 30% rise was detected in case of the prices of fresh vegetables (36%), milk (35%), groats (29%) and potatoes (30.6%).

In January compared to December, the consumer price index was mainly influenced by the decrease in the prices of electricity, heat energy and fuels, whereas the prices of electricity fell 2%, heat energy 1.2% and gas 8%. The major share of impact was also given by the seasonal sales of clothing and footwear, 2.9% price increase of motor fuel, nearly 10% price decrease of fresh vegetables, end of sales of coffee, price increase of sugar, special offers of flight tickets and more expensive eating out. In January compared to December, the price of cucumbers decreased by more than a third, the price of tomatoes by a fourth and the prices of flight tickets nearly by a fifth. The price of grapes increased by 26%, the price of Chinese cabbage by 19% and the price of sugar by 13.4%.

In January 2011 several service providers have increased the prices by 2–3%, the prices in catering establishments have also risen on average by 1.8%.

Changes caused by the rounding related to the transition to the euro remained mainly within the range of -0.2% and +0.2%.

Statistics Estonia updates the weights system of the consumer price index and the representative goods every year due to the continuous change in the consumption structure of the population and also prices. In 2011, the weights system of the consumer price index corresponds to the average expenditure structure of the population in 2010. The base prices used for calculations are December prices of the year 2010. To ensure the comparability with the previous periods, the consumer price index is continued to be published on the base 1997 = 100. The linking month is December 2010.

The table presents the expenditure structure (weights) used in 2010, as well as the expenditure structure used since January index of 2011.