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Ukraine's inflation may reach 50 pct in Q2: official

Xinhua, April 9, 2015 Adjust font size:

Ukraine's annual inflation rate may reach 50 percent in the second quarter of this year due to higher utility prices, a senior official said Thursday.

"The rising inflation rate will be driven by the increase in tariffs for public utilities," Sergey Nikolaychuk, head of the central bank's monetary policy department, told reporters.

Meanwhile, the costs of food, non-grocery goods and market services are expected to fall in April-June 2015, he said.

Starting April 1, Ukrainian households were hit with an average 330 percent increase in their gas bills, while heating and electricity costs have risen 72 percent and 19 percent respectively.

According to the State Statistic Service, in the first quarter of 2015, Ukraine's inflation rose 36.3 percent from the same period of the previous year.

Ukraine's central bank estimated that inflation in the country will stand at 30 percent for this year, compared with 24.9 percent in 2014. Endi