Page 156 - Special Topic Session (STS) - Volume 3

STS538 Rameshwar S.
Table 1: Some Indicators of six countries focused in the paper
Some Ghana Sierra Gambia BVI USVI India
Indicators Leone
Population 28,800 7,400 2,100 32 107 1,135,000
in (‘000)
GDP per 2,046 510 709 34,200 37,000 1,050
head ($)
2017
Annual 9.0 17.1 6.4 2.1 1.0 2.05
inflation
rate
(%) (Jan-19) (Jan-19) (Dec-18) (Jan-19)

Ghana
The data collection and compilation of CPI in Ghana is done by the Ghana
Statistical Service (GSS). The Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), the predecessor
of GSS was responsible for it since 1963. The CPI covers the whole country,
both urban and rural areas of all ten regions. There are 242 goods and services
in the basket. In 2003 on the advice of an IMF Consultant, the data collection
was done twice a month instead of once per month before. Forty markets,
made up of 9 urban and 31 rural markets have been sampled in the country.
For each item, six price quotations are taken in the urban market and three in
the rural market. Ghana concluded in a paper presented at UNECE and ILO CPI
conference that there is not much to gain from the two readings vis-à-vis cost
and quality of data. Collecting prices once per month would be 50% less and
supervision will be more effective.
Sierra Leone
Efforts to construct a CPI in Sierra Leone date as far back as 1941, however,
a systematic attempt on scientific lines started with the quarterly CPI for
Freetown. This CPI that was led by the Ministry of Labour covered low income
earning families with the weight base as 1951. Later the Ministry revised the
CPI with 1961 as the base. This index covered African families of two or more
persons with no earner receiving more than £20.00 (or Leone 40.00) per
month. In 1973, the work of compilations of CPI was transferred to the Central
Statistics Office (CSO). The revision of CPI for Freetown with base 1978=100
was published in August 1984.
According to Sierra Leone CPI Report 2012 by Statistics Sierra Leone (SSL,
CSO renamed) published in September 2013, inflation was being monitored
on a monthly and annual basis. The composite CPI was computed as a
weighted average of the different center sub-indices. The expenditure weights
were obtained from the 2003/04 Sierra Leone Integrated Household Survey
(SLIHS) Income and Expenditure Module. The CPI basket covered a total of 400

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