Interregional multiple regression models of inflation rates in Nigeria

Abstract

The differences in inflation rates in the regions of Nigeria occur with little or no attention paid to it but all effort is concentrated on the national inflation rates. Regions of Nigeria are as large as some countries of Africa and as a result it became imperative to look at the contribution of each of the region’s inflation rates to the national rates. Original prices data collected by the National Bureau of Statistics of Nigeria was used to produce state price index series. This research made use of the state price index series to compute state inflation rates for all the states. The already existing regional structure of the country was utilized and average inflation rates of states under each region was computed and used to generate a multiple regression model of inflation rate for the regions. The study was able to discover that not all the regions contribute to the rise in inflation rates in Nigeria. From the research also, it was discovered that North West and South East regions have minimum contributions to the rising inflation rates in Nigeria during the period under study.