According to the Central Administration of Statistics (CAS), the monthly change in the consumer price index stood at 6.10% in March 2022, compared to a contraction of 3.13% in the previous month. On an annual basis, Lebanon’s CPI soared by 208.13% to 1,019.81 in March, compared to 330.97 a year earlier. The average monthly increase in Lebanon’s CPI stood at 3.55% in the first quarter of 2022 when compared to the same period in 2021. All index constituents saw a sharp rise in their respective prices. In details, the index portrays a 176.10% annual appreciation in the prices of clothing & footwear (5.2% weight in the index), a 390.39% increase in the prices of food & non-alcoholic beverages (20.0% weight in the index), a 488.85% surge in transportation prices (13.1% weight in the index) amid the rise in fuel & gasoline prices after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the total lift of Central Bank subsidies on fuel imports, and a shambolic 388.57% rally in the prices of housing – water, electricity, gas & other fuels (11.8% weight in the index), not to mention the frantic 349.45% rise in the prices of restaurants & hotels (2.8% weight in the index). The following section captures the fluctuation in the key constituents of Lebanon’s consumer basket:

On a geographical basis, all regions saw a monthly rise in their CPI values, with the largest increase taking place in the South (10.21%) followed by Nabatieh (9.80%), Bekaa (7.64%), North (5.57%), Beirut (5.14%), and Mount Lebanon (5.02%) regions.