The New Year is approaching, and Georgian housewives are already preparing for this great event. So does the ISET-Policy Institute. The special dish we have cooked for our readers is a New Year Supra Index. Served on the Georgian Supra Map, the Index shows the cost (in GEL) of a standard supra meal for a family of 5-6 persons in each one of Georgia’s regions.
Geostat has released its preliminary estimates of GDP growth for the third quarter. The estimated Q3 growth is 2.5%, only 0.1 percentage points below the ISET-PI forecasted value. The forecast for GDP growth in the fourth quarter now stands at 3.6%.
The average cost of cooking one standard portion of Imeretian Khachapuri increased to 3.66 GEL in November 2015. This is 1.4% higher m/m (compared to October 2015), and 9.6% higher y/y (compared to the same month of the previous year, November 2014). Given that it mostly consists of food prices that are subject to sharper seasonal fluctuations, the upward trend in Khachapuri Index is somewhat steeper than that of GeoStat’s official Consumer Price Index (CPI).
Khachapuri index changes its value in different regions according to seasonal demand and supply peculiarities. The latter is affected by milk production cycles (low in fall and winter, high in spring and summer), Georgia’s religious calendar (e.g. the Great Lent), as well as the ups and downs in tourism.
In August 2015, domestic production in Georgia increased by 2.3% annually – a figure that is expected to retain stability around this year’s overall trend. Consumer price inflation reached its highest value in two years (5.4%). The August 2015 increase in electricity tariffs and the growing number of tourist arrivals put additional upward pressure on consumer price inflation.