April consumer prices up 2.1% y/y; fourth straight month in 2% range

Consumer prices continue to hover on the two-percent range here in Korea for the fourth month in a row.

Park Jun-han covers the findings for this past April.

Inflation in South Korea persists despite low oil prices, spurred by high food and dining out costs.

According to data from Statistics Korea on Friday, South Korea's inflation in April stood at 2-point-1 percent year-on-year.

Consumer prices have been showing increases in the two-percent range over the past four months.

High exchange rates due to the weakening of the Korean won and supply constraints pushed up the prices of processed foods and the cost of dining out.

Compared to April last year, prices of processed foods went up by 4-point-1 percent.

This is the highest level of increase in 16 months.

In the same period, the cost of dining out went up by 3-point-2 percent.

This is the highest level of increase in 13 months.

Declining global oil prices eased inflationary pressure, as prices of petroleum products fell 1-point-7 percent, offsetting earlier gains.

An expert from Statistics Korea pointed to the impact of the drop in global oil prices from around 89 U.S. dollars per barrel in April last year to around 68 dollars per barrel this April as a reason why further increases in consumer prices did not occur.

"The fluctuations in consumer prices were due to a downward shift in petroleum products due to a decline in global oil prices."

While the rise in the exchange rate contributed to April's inflation, and falling global oil prices limited further increases in consumer prices, this data alone does not indicate a long-term economic trend.

"Although it used to go up, the exchange rate is falling a lot at the moment, so I think the exchange rate problem will go away sooner or later.

About the global oil price issue, oil prices have also dropped a lot recently, but they might go up again, so I don't think the inflation issue is stabilized yet."

Meanwhile, the prices of fresh produce fell by 1-point-9 percent, marking the largest drop since March 2022.

Despite global uncertainties, an expert from Statistics Korea expects the country's inflation level to remain around 2 percent in the near future.

Park Jun-han, Arirang News.