More households expect higher inflation ahead: RBI survey

A larger share of households in the country expect higher inflation for both three months and one year periods going ahead, according to the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) bi-monthly survey on inflation expectations released on Monday.

Households expect some rise in price and inflationary pressures across major product groups for the year ahead, states the survey conducted across 19 major cities.

Expectations regarding overall prices and inflation over the next three months were more aligned with those of food products and services; for the year ahead, such alignment is more pronounced with the prospects for food products and housing segments, the survey added.

At the same time the survey states that households’ perception on current inflation declined by 20 basis points (bps) from the previous survey round to 8.2 per cent in November.

Median (average) inflation expectation remained stable for the three months ahead period at 9.1 per cent, but it increased for the one year horizon by 20 bps to 10.1 per cent in November 2023.

The survey was conducted during November 2-11, with responses from 6,036 urban households.

Female respondents accounted for 50.1 per cent of this sample.