Euro area annual inflation was 3.1% in December 2007, unchanged compared with November. A year earlier the rate was 1.9%. Monthly inflation was 0.4% in December 2007.

EU annual inflation was 3.2% in December 2007, up from 3.1% in November. A year earlier the rate was 2.2%. Monthly inflation was 0.4% in December 2007.

Inflation in the EU Member States

In December 2007, the lowest annual rates were observed in the Netherlands (1.6%), Finland (1.9%) and the United Kingdom (2.1%), and the highest in Latvia (14.0%), Bulgaria (11.6%) and Estonia (9.7%). Compared with November 2007, annual inflation rose in seventeen Member States, remained stable in three and fell in six.

The lowest 12-month averages up to December 2007 were registered in Malta (0.7%) and France, the Netherlands and Finland (1.6% each), and the highest in Latvia (10.1%), Hungary (7.9%) and Bulgaria (7.6%).

Euro area

The main components with the highest annual rates in December 2007 were education (9.4%), transport (5.6%) and food (4.8%), while the lowest annual rates were observed for communications (-2.3%), recreation & culture (0.1%) and clothing (1.0%). Concerning the detailed sub-indices, fuels for transport (+0.49 percentage points), milk, cheese & eggs (+0.18) and heating oil (+0.17) had the largest upward impacts on the headline rate, while telecommunications (-0.16), garments (-0.12) and IT equipment (-0.08) had the biggest downward impacts.

The main components with the highest monthly rates were recreation & culture (2.3%), hotels & restaurants (1.1%) and food (0.7%), and the lowest were clothing (-0.8%), communications (-0.4%) and alcohol & tobacco and education (0.0% each). In particular, package holidays (+0.21 percentage points), accommodation services (+0.07) and air transport (+0.03) had the largest upward impacts, while garments and fuels for transport (-0.07 each) and rents and telecommunications (-0.02 each) had the biggest downward impacts.