Tunisia's Inflation Rate Sees Slight Decrease in May 2025
According to data published by the National Institute of Statistics (INS), Tunisia's inflation rate recorded a slight decrease in May 2025, standing at 5.4% compared to 5.6% in April. This decline is mainly explained by the slowdown in the progression of food prices, which showed an increase of 6.7% in May compared to 7.3% the previous month.
In fact, Tunisia's inflation rate was influenced by the annual evolution of consumer prices. The surge in prices of fresh vegetables, 25.3%, fresh fruits, 22.8%, lamb meat, 19.8%, and fresh fish, 10.8%, was partially offset by the notable decrease in prices of food oils, -22.2%, and eggs, -5.1%.
In parallel, manufactured products saw their prices rise by 5.2% over the year, mainly due to the increase in the "clothing and footwear" group, 9.4%, and household maintenance products, 4.9%. Services experienced an annual increase of 4.6%, driven particularly by restaurants, cafes, and hotels, whose prices rose by 10.8%.
The underlying inflation rate, which excludes food and energy products, remains stable at 5.5%. In detail, prices of free products increased by 6.5% over the year, compared to only 1.6% for price-controlled products. The disparity is even more marked for food products, with an inflation rate of 7.5% for free products against 0.9% for controlled products.
On a monthly basis, consumer prices rose by 0.3% between April and May 2025. This increase is mainly due to the rise in food prices, 0.4%, clothing, 0.5%, and the "restaurants and hotels" group, 0.5%. In detail, lamb meat prices increased by 4.6% over the month, and fresh fruits by 3.3%, while egg prices dropped by 6.8%, and poultry by 1.7%.
Clothing prices rose by 0.7%, and shoe prices by 0.2%, contributing to the inflationary dynamic of the month. On the services side, the increase in accommodation prices, 2.3%, pulled up the prices of the "restaurants and hotels" group.
The sectors that contributed the most to the overall inflation rate are manufactured products (2%) and fresh food products (2.2%). By regime, it is the "non-food free" groups (3.2%) and "food free" groups (1.9%) that weigh the most on the general price index.
