The central statistics office has announced that the infllation rate has increased by an average of minus 0.5 percent for the month of September from the August rate of 0.4 percent.
"The month-on-month inflation rate (monthly percentage change) in September 2009 was -0.5 percent shedding 0.9 percentage points on the August 2009 rate of 0.4 percent," the CSO.

"This means that prices as measured by the all items Consumer Price Index (CPI) increased by an average of -0.5 percent from August 2009 to September 2009."

The month-on-month inflation is calculated by the percentage change in the index of the relevant month of the current year compared with the index of the previous month in the current year.

The CSO said the month-on-month food and non-alcoholic beverages inflation for September stood at -1.2 percent, shedding 1.25 percentage points on that of August rate of 0.05 while non food inflation shed 0.72 percentage points from 0.52 percent for August to -0.2 percent for September.