These figures come from Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union.
Inflation in the EU Member States
In May 2011, the lowest annual rates were observed in Ireland (1.2%), Sweden (1.7%) and the Czech Republic (2.0%), and the highest in Romania (8.5%), Estonia (5.5%) and Lithuania (5.0%). Compared with April 2011, annual inflation rose in fourteen Member States, remained stable in four and fell in nine.
The lowest 12-month averages4 up to May 2011 were registered in Ireland (-0.2%), Sweden (1.5%) and the Netherlands (1.6%), and the highest in Romania (7.5%), Greece (4.8%) and Estonia (4.5%).
Euro area
The main components with the highest annual rates in May 2011 were transport (5.3%), housing (4.7%) and alcohol & tobacco (3.3%), while the lowest annual rates were observed for communications (-1.0%), recreation & culture (0.0%) and household equipment (1.0%). Concerning the detailed sub-indices, fuels for transport (+0.48 percentage points), heating oil (+0.15) and electricity (+0.12) had the largest upward impacts on the headline rate, while telecommunications (-0.12), rents (-0.08) and cars (-0.07) had the biggest downward impacts.
The main components with the highest monthly rates were food (0.5%), alcohol & tobacco, clothing and hotels & restaurants (0.3% each), while the lowest were recreation & culture (-0.5%), transport (-0.4%) and communications (‑0.3%). In particular, fruit (+0.04 percentage points) and milk, cheese & eggs (+0.02) had the largest upward impacts, while package holidays (-0.05), fuels for transport and heating oil (-0.04 each) had the biggest downward impacts.
