Inflation “here to stay” warns finance council

The President of Portugal’s Council of Public Finances, Nazaré Costa Cabral, has warned that inflation in all likelihood is here to stay.

Speaking on RTP 3 on Tuesday evening, Nazaré said there were foreseeable consequences and that steps needed to be taken now.
The CFP president warned that the inflation rate would likely continue to rise over the coming months, with prices increasing, and that the consequences would be long lasting.
“Inflation is here to stay. This inflationary process that we’re experiencing could be long lasting and with long lasting consequences”, she said on the programme ‘Tudo é Economia’. (Everything is Economy)
She added “consequences should be anticipated and steps taken to offset them”. “From the moment when we have significant and long-lasting inflation we are, to a certain point, no longer referring to increases in salaries and the evolution of productivity indexed wages, and that is unfortunate”, she said.
At the end of March, the CFP that it could not assess the macroeconomic scenario underlying the 2022-2026 Stability Programme, adding that it was not “a forecast for not incorporating the policy measures to be adopted”.
António Costa’s government estimated an increase in inflation of 1.3% for 2021 and 2.9% for 2022 which compares to the 0.9% foreseen in the State Budget 2022 proposal which was rejected in October.