Belgium’s consumer prices increased for the first time in six months in April, figures from Statistics Belgium showed Wednesday.
The consumer price index rose 0.29 percent year-over-year in April, reversing a 0.40 percent fall in the previous month.
Inflation has remained negative since October 2014, when it was running at 0.09 percent, the agency said.
The index in April climbed mainly due to the fact that the effect of the VAT reduction on electricity that fell to 6 percent from 21 percent.
Excluding energy, inflation accelerated to 1.16 percent in April from 0.85 percent in the preceding month. Food inflation also climbed to 0.60 percent from 0.03 percent.
Core consumer prices, which excludes energy and unprocessed food rose 1.19 percent in April, faster than previous month’s 1.0 percent increase.
Month-on-month, consumer prices went up 0.38 percent in April.
The material has been provided by InstaForex Company – www.instaforex.com