DUBLIN (Reuters) – Annual Irish inflation ticked back up to 8% in February from 7.5% a month earlier, according to a flash estimate of the EU’s Harmonised Index of Consumer Prices (HICP), Ireland’s Central Statistics Office (CSO) said on Wednesday.
Consumer prices were 1.4% higher month-on-month, the CSO added, after food prices rose by an estimated 1.2% and energy prices fell by 0.2% on a monthly basis.
Excluding energy, the HICP is estimated to have grown by 5.8% since February 2022, the CSO said.
Finance Minister Michael McGrath said last week that he expected Irish inflation to average between 4% and 5% across 2023, lower than the 7.1% his department most recently forecast last September.
Eurostat will publish flash estimates of inflation for the euro zone as a whole on Thursday.
(Reporting by Padraic Halpin; Editing by Andrew Heavens)
