Inflation Rises Slightly to 15.93% In May As Food Price Pressures Ease

Nigeria’s inflation rate rose slightly to 15.93 per cent in May 2026, even as monthly price pressures eased, according to the latest Consumer Price Index (CPI) report released by the National Bureau of Statistics on Monday.

The report showed that headline inflation increased from 15.69 per cent recorded in April 2026, but remained significantly lower than the 26.06 per cent posted in May 2025.

The statistics agency said the CPI climbed to 140.7 points in May, representing a 2.4-point increase from the preceding month following the adoption of a new base year of 2024 and a weight reference period of 2023 under its recently completed rebasing exercise.

However, on a month-on-month basis, headline inflation moderated to 1.75 per cent in May from 2.13 per cent in April, indicating a slower pace of price increases during the month.

According to the NBS, food and non-alcoholic beverages remained the largest contributor to headline inflation, accounting for 6.38 percentage points. Restaurants and accommodation services contributed 2.06 percentage points, while transport added 1.70 percentage points.

The least contributors were recreation, sport and culture at 0.05 per cent, alcoholic beverages, tobacco and narcotics at 0.06 per cent, and insurance and financial services at 0.07 per cent.

Food inflation eased during the review period, with the month-on-month rate declining to 2.98 per cent from 3.63 per cent in April.

On a year-on-year basis, food inflation stood at 16.96 per cent, lower than the 24.55 per cent recorded in May 2025.

Core inflation, which excludes volatile agricultural produce and energy prices, rose to 16.82 per cent on a year-on-year basis in May.

On a monthly basis, core inflation accelerated to 1.94 per cent from 1.03 per cent in April, suggesting sustained pressure from non-food components of the inflation basket.

The report also provided data for newly introduced inflation indicators following the rebasing exercise.

It showed that services inflation recorded the highest monthly increase at 2.84 per cent, followed by imported food inflation at 2.28 per cent. Farm produce, energy and goods inflation recorded monthly increases of 0.86 per cent, 0.72 per cent and 0.73 per cent respectively.

On a year-on-year basis, services inflation stood at 17.92 per cent, imported food inflation at 14.60 per cent, energy inflation at 5.73 per cent and goods inflation at 6.62 per cent. Farm produce inflation, however, declined by 1.26 per cent.

Urban inflation stood at 16.07 per cent year-on-year and 1.99 per cent month-on-month, compared with 15.60 per cent and 1.17 per cent respectively for rural areas.

At the state level, Yobe recorded the highest year-on-year all-items inflation rate at 24.94 per cent, followed by Anambra at 23.29 per cent and Sokoto at 22.60 per cent.

The lowest annual inflation rates were recorded in Niger at 3.07 per cent, Plateau at 7.10 per cent and Edo at 7.73 per cent.
On a monthly basis, Benue posted the highest inflation increase at 8.23 per cent, followed by Bayelsa at 7.62 per cent and Borno at 7.29 per cent.

Niger recorded the sharpest monthly decline in inflation at 4.55 per cent, while Zamfara and Taraba posted decreases of 3.36 per cent and 2.67 per cent respectively.

Food inflation varied widely across states.
Adamawa recorded the highest year-on-year food inflation rate at 29.62 per cent, followed by Kwara at 28.47 per cent and Rivers at 28.40 per cent.

Borno recorded a decline of 6.53 per cent in annual food inflation, while Taraba and Bayelsa recorded the slowest increases at 1.13 per cent and 5.99 per cent respectively.

On a month-on-month basis, Bauchi recorded the highest food inflation rate at 7.73 per cent, followed by Ogun at 6.86 per cent and Jigawa at 6.69 per cent.
Niger, Katsina and Gombe recorded declines in food inflation of 3.54 per cent, 3.48 per cent and 2.22 per cent respectively.

The bureau attributed the movement in food prices to changes in the average cost of staple items including onions, maize grains, melon, water yam, cassava flour, crayfish, fresh pepper, tomatoes, wheat grain, cassava tuber, yam tuber, sweet potatoes, ginger, plantain and cowpea.