Inflation in Argentina exceeds 100%

Women look at items displayed at a supermarket in Buenos Aires on March 15, 2023. — Inflation in Argentina was 102.5 percent in the 12 months to February, breaking a symbolic three-digit mark and hitting a new 32-year high. In Latin America’s third-largest economy, inflation rose 6.6% in February and 13.1% year-to-date, Indec, the national statistical institute, said on March 14. (Photo by STRINGER/AFP)

Inflation in Argentina was 102.5 percent in the 12 months to February, breaking a symbolic three-digit mark and hitting a new 32-year high.

In Latin America’s third-largest economy, inflation surged 6.6% in February and 13.1% year-to-date, according to Indec, the national statistical institute.

Argentina has one of the highest inflation rates in the world.

It reached 94.8 percent in 2022, the highest annual rate in the country since 1991, when it topped 171 percent.

In the previous two years, hyperinflation had exceeded 2,000 percent.

The government has set an inflation target for 2023 of 60 percent.

Argentina has been battling an economic crisis for years, posting double-digit inflation in each of the past 12 years.

In December, President Alberto Fernandez’s centre-left government reached an agreement with food and personal care companies to freeze the prices of about 2,000 products until March and raise the limit of another 30,000 products to four percent per month.

According to official figures as of mid-2022, about 36.5 percent of Argentina’s 47 million people live in poverty, including 2.6 million in extreme poverty.

The Argentine economy grew by 5.2 percent in 2022, up from 10.3 percent the previous year as a three-year recession ended.

On Monday, the IMF said it had reached an agreement with the government in Buenos Aires on a fourth revision of the South American country’s aid package, paving the way for about $5.3 billion.

The new tranche of funding will bring the funds allocated to Argentina since the signing of the aid program in March 2022 to $28.8 billion.

Argentina’s economic growth will slow to 2 percent in 2023, according to the World Bank.

If this happens, then for the first time in 15 years, Argentina has experienced three consecutive years of growth.