Index of household consumption of goods, September 2006

The consumption of food, beverage and tobacco increased by 0.7 per cent from August to September. The consumption of groceries went up by about one percent, while the consumption of tobacco went down by 3.3 percent.

The commodity group “other commodities”, including all other commodities than food, tobacco, beverage, electricity and heating fuels, purchase of vehicles and petrol increased by 1.7 per cent from the previous month. The consumption of books and commodities related to recreation increased by more than three percent.

The consumption of electricity went down by nearly four per cent from August to September. Higher prices on electricity contributed to this decrease. At the same time the temperatures were above normal this month, which also gives lower consumption of electricity. This could be the reason why the consumption of heating fuels was low in September.

Purchase of vehicles was 3.7 per cent lower this month compared to August.

The index of commodity consumption was 4.6 percent higher this September compared to September 2005, according to the unadjusted figures. The consumption of clothes, shoes, furniture and white goods were clearly higher than 12 months before, while the consumption of electricity was lower.

Method differs from the index of retail sale

The index of commodity consumption describes the development in household consumption of goods, while the index of retail sales measures the development in retail sales. As opposed to the index of retail sales, the index of commodity consumption includes goods that are not sold in retail trade. Thus, the calculation of the index of commodity consumption is based on information from the index of retail sales in addition to information on purchases of cars, sales of petrol and oil to petrol stations and the consumption of electricity unadjusted for changes in temperature. This may result in deviations in the development of the two indices.

The index of commodity consumption uses the same definitions and methods of compilation as the quarterly national accounts, and thus serves as an indicator of household consumption of goods in the quarterly national accounts.

Timeliness is important in the release of statistics, and the index of commodity consumption may therefore have to rely on preliminary estimates in some cases. Such estimates are replaced in the subsequent release. This applies, inter alia, to figures on electricity consumption, where short-term statistics from the Norwegian Water Resources and Energy Directorate (NVE) are used. Later on these short-term statistics are replaced by electricity statistics from Statistics Norway. This implies that the index of commodity consumption normally will be revised in the subsequent publishing.