THE National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said the Nigerian inflation rate has sustained a downward trend and dropped to 15.1 per cent in January, from 15.15 per cent recorded in December 2025.
The NBS announced the increase in its consumer price index (CPI) on Monday, February 18.
According to NBS, the January 2026 headline inflation rate showed a decrease of 0.05 per cent compared to the December 2025 headline inflation rate.
“On a year-on-year basis, the headline inflation rate was 12.51 per cent lower than the rate recorded in January 2025 (27.61 per cent). This shows that the headline inflation rate (year-on-year basis) decreased in January 2026 compared to the same month in the preceding year (i.e., January 2025).
“On a month-on-month basis, the headline inflation rate in January 2026 was -2.88 per cent, which was 3.4 per cent lower than the rate recorded in December 2025 (0.54 per cent),” the statistics office said.
The NBS also explained that the rate of increase in the average price level was lower than the rate of increase in the average price level in December 2025.
It disclosed that the food inflation rate for January was 8.89 per cent on a year-on-year basis.
This, the bureau said, is 20.74 points lower compared to the rate recorded in December 2025 (29.63 per cent).
“On a month-on-month basis, the food inflation rate in January 2026 was -6.02 per cent, down by 5.66 per cent compared to December 2025 (-0.36 per cent),” the report said.
The NBS explained that the inflation ease could be attributed to the rate of decrease in the average prices of water yam, eggs, green peas, groundnut oil, soya beans, palm oil, maize (corn) grains, guinea corn, beans, beef meat, melon (egusi) unshelled, cassava tuber, cow peas (white), etc.
“The average annual rate of food inflation for the twelve months ending January 2026 over the previous twelve-month average was 20.29 per cent, which was 18.18 per cent points lower compared with the average annual rate of change recorded in January 2025 (38.47 per cent),”it said.
The NBS further said that in January 2026, food inflation was the highest year-on-year in Kogi (19.84 per cent), Benue (18.38 per cent), and Adamawa (17.29 per cent).
On the other hand, states such as Ebonyi (1.69 per cent), Abia (3.23 per cent), and Imo (3.74 per cent) recorded the slowest rise in food inflation on a year-on-year basis.
Harrison Edeh is a journalist with the International Centre for Investigative Reporting, always determined to drive advocacy for good governance through holding public officials and businesses accountable.