Page 9 - Food Inflation in Southeast Asia 2

Figure 2: presents the trends in the movement of year-on-year rate of inflation based on CFPI (Base 2015=100) of
various Southeast Asian countries (January 2001 – March 2024). As compared to the other Southeast Asian countries
and also the mean and the median CFPI-based inflation rate of the Southeast Asian region as a whole, the variation of
CFPI-based inflation rate of Brunei has been less, and for most months of the period January 2001 – March 2024, it
stays below the CFPI-based inflation rates of other countries and the Southeast Asian region as a whole.

Figure 2: Trends in year-on-year inflation rate based on CFPI (Base 2015=100) of various Southeast Asian
countries (January, 2001 – March, 2024)

Source: FAO, https://www.fao.org/faostat/en/#data/CP

Figure 3: shows the movement of CFPI and General CPI over time for Brunei Darussalam. The CFPI and CPI move
close to each other over time, indicating a high correlation between the two. The rising gulf between CFPI and CPI has
been accentuated since around 2017, with CFPI becoming higher than CPI. From 2020-21 onwards, especially, the
CFPI line has become steeper than the CPI line, which could be attributed to global supply chain bottlenecks affecting
food imports of Brunei, thus affecting the rate of inflation in CFPI. In fact, during January 2017-September 2018, April
2020-April 2021, July 2021-November 2021, and April 2022-December 2023, Brunei witnessed CFPI-based inflation
rate exceeding General CPI-based inflation rate.

THE CHALLENGE OF FOOD INFLATION IN SOUTHEAST ASIATION IN SOUTHEAST ASIA
THE CHALLENGE OF FOOD INFLA 9 9