The euro area annual inflation rate was 7.4% in March 2022, up from 5.9% in February. A year earlier, the rate was 1.3%. European Union annual inflation was 7.8% in March 2022, up from 6.2% in February. A year earlier, the rate was 1.7%. These figures are published by Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union.
The lowest annual rates were registered in Malta (4.5%), France (5.1%) and Portugal (5.5%). The highest annual rates were recorded in Lithuania (15.6%), Estonia (14.8%) and Czechia (11.9%). Compared with February, annual inflation fell in two Member States and rose in twenty-five.
In March, the highest contribution to the annual euro area inflation rate came from energy (+4.36 percentage points, pp), followed by services (+1.12 pp), food, alcohol & tobacco (+1.07 pp) and non-energy industrial goods (+0.90 pp).
