Ljubljana, 06 February (STA) - Slovenia's annual inflation rate in January was at 1.1%, which is 0.4 percentage points lower than in January 2018. On the monthly level, a 1.1% deflation was recorded due to the winter sales of clothes and footwear, the Statistics Office said on Wednesday.

Contributing the most to the annual inflation rate (0.3 percentage points) were more expensive goods and services in the group electricity, gas and other fuels, with the prices of heating going up the most (+17.5%).

Just as much (0.3 points) contributed the prices of goods and service in the group recreation and culture. The prices of sports equipment went up by 15.2% and holiday packages by 5.1%.

Costlier services of hotels and restaurants (+3.1%) added another 0.2 points.

On the other hand, cheaper products in transport brought the annual inflation down by 0.3 points. The prices of cars dropped by 2.4%, fuel by 7.4% and diesel fuel by 2.8%.

The prices of goods and services went up by 0.4% and 2.6%, respectively, in a year.

The monthly deflation of 1.1% resulted from lower prices of cloths and footwear (-13.4%), which reduced the inflation by 1.0 percentage point.

Cheaper petroleum products lowered it by another 0.3 points (the prices of liquid fuels was down by 6.0%, and of motor fuels and lubricants by 4.5%). Cheaper package holidays (-7.2%) decreased it by another 0.2 points and cheaper electricity (-1.5%) by 0.1 point.

Meanwhile, costlier food and non-alcoholic beverages (-1.5%) had the opposite effect, pulling the monthly figure up by 0.3 points. The prices of meat went up by 1.9% and of vegetables by 4.0%.

Costlier restaurant services (+1.6%) and recreational devices, gardening and pets (+2.2%) raised it by 0.1 point each.

Measured with the harmonised index of consumer prices, an EU standard, the annual inflation in Slovenia ran at 1.2% in January. In monthly comparison, it reached 0.9%.