## Section I. Detailed Technical Assessment and Recommendations

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---

### Summary of Mission Outcomes and Priority Recommendations
- A technical assistance (TA) mission on the Consumer Price Index (CPI), sponsored by IMF AFRITAC South (AFS), was conducted during April 22–26, 2024 to the National Bureau of Statistics of Seychelles (NBS).
- Objectives: assess current CPI methodology and identify areas for improvement, including assisting NBS with planning of the CPI update. Main output: a detailed work plan guiding NBS.
- Key assessments:
  - CPI broadly follows international guidelines and good practices, but methodological improvements are needed.
  - NBS is small with high staff turnover, dependence on few key personnel, and lacks internal documentation of CPI production routines.
  - Current CPI uses weights from HBS 2018/19; these weights are likely outdated.
  - A new HBS is planned to be launched in June/July 2024 for a 12-month period (HBS 2024/25).
  - CPI currently compiles a direct fixed basket index (prices compared to average of 2020) and is chained to long-term series with index reference period 2014=100; last update did not change index reference period.
  - Mission recommended a Modified (short-term) Young index emphasizing month-to-month chaining; recommended in the CPI Manual (2020).
- Mission emphasis:
  - Timely introduction of new weights to avoid implementing “old” expenditure data.
  - Plan and implement changes gradually given limited resources.
  - NBS requested further CPI assistance for the broad scope of advised changes.
- Priority Recommendations:
  - July 2025: Make experimental chained short-term (month-to-month) relatives by calculating the Modified Young index and compare current and new methodology for a period of at least six months. — Responsible: NBS
  - November 2025: Develop CPI weights based on COICOP 2018 and HBS 2024/25. — Responsible: NBS
  - February 2026: Implement new methodology for CPI including new weight, price and index reference period and a new classification standard. — Responsible: NBS

### A. Organization and Resources
- Institutional responsibility:
  - NBS of Seychelles compiles national CPI. Economic Statistics Section covers CPI, PPI, Industrial Production Index, National Accounts, and more.
- Staffing and capacity:
  - CPI central staff: two people responsible for central data collection, compilation, analysis, and dissemination.
  - Field data collectors: less than 10 people involved in data collection.
  - Head office CPI staff also work on other statistics like PPI and Employment.
  - CPI field staff have limited training in CPI-specific procedures and concepts; need for increased CPI knowledge in data collection, price concept, item replacements, and item specifications.
  - Head office CPI staff lack experience and capacity concerning a CPI update; they were not directly involved in the 2020/21 update.
- Risks and recommendations:
  - High staff turnover and no internal documentation → CPI vulnerable to staff changes.
  - Mission created and discussed a template for internal documentation.
  - Recommended: document CPI production routines and methodology to ensure CPI quality and continuity.

### B. Scope and Purpose
- Coverage and principles:
  - CPI relates to entire territory and covers all income groups; follows resident principle (expenditure of resident households included; expenditure of residents spent abroad excluded).
  - Nonresidents (tourists) and non-monetary expenditures (e.g., owner-occupied housing (OOH)) are excluded.
  - Price collection covers islands Mahe, Praslin and La Digue where 98.9 percent of the population resides (HBS 2018/19).
- Uses:
  - All-item CPI used for indexation of wages and as main inflation indicator for monetary policy.
  - NBS also disseminates a Harmonized Index of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) with definitions that may differ from national index.

### C. Update of the CPI of Seychelles
- Current status:
  - CPI compiled on weights from HBS 2018/19; previous update implemented January 2021.
  - NBS plans HBS 2024/25: planned launch June/July 2024; 12-month fielding period. Pilot survey run by Social Statistics to evaluate questionnaires and response rates.
  - Sample design changed since previous survey: plan to use both diary reporting and prefilled forms.
  - Discussion on including COICOP 2018 classification in HBS; unclear if achieved.
- Recommendations and timing:
  - Mission recommended implementing COICOP 2018 in CPI regardless of final HBS decisions; otherwise NBS may wait another five to seven years to adopt new standard.
  - Mission planned implementation of updated CPI in January 2026, but stressed dependency on HBS data; with further delays, implementation may be January 2027.
  - Importance of minimizing lag between weight reference period (2024/25) and CPI implementation to avoid outdated “new” weights.
  - COICOP 2018 adds complexity: HBS data needs reclassification and back data series calculation; users will request comparable series.
  - Mission recommended reaggregating indices 2021–2025 by using COICOP 2018 based on current weights and current sample of goods and services.
  - NBS should be aware of deviations between official series with COICOP 1999 and new series with COICOP 2018; official back data period will remain 2014=100 series.
  - Advised to “un-chain” 2014=100 series by using the 2020=100 figures in back data aggregation.
  - Recommended to change the index reference period to the year before implementation (e.g., if implementation January 2026, set 2025=100) to alert users to breaks in the series.
  - For timely introduction of weights, obtain preliminary HBS figures to start identifying products and pricing, and coding to COICOP 2018.
  - Recommended annual overlap linking new CPI basket to old one.
- Recommended Actions:
  - Reduce the time lag between weight and price reference period as much as possible to introduce timely expenditure data.
  - Plan and execute the CPI update according to the detailed work plan made during mission.

### D. Index Calculations
- Current methodology:
  - NBS calculates a direct fixed basket price index comparing current prices to average prices of 2020 (2020=100).
  - Index reference period was not updated during the 2021 update; series are chained with a fixed linking factor (December 2020 index) monthly to achieve long-term index 2014=100.
  - In practice, despite being chained, the index behaves as a fixed basket index.
  - It was not possible to determine whether weights in the 2021 update were price-updated.
- Regional indices and stratification:
  - No regional or island-specific indices are calculated; prices from Mahe, Praslin and La Digue are grouped together with no further stratification.
- Recommended methodological change:
  - Introduce a Modified Young index (demonstrated during mission): a monthly chained index (previous month as price reference) to increase flexibility for matching samples, resampling, treatment of missing prices, and quality adjustments.
  - Young index keeps expenditure shares from HBS (no price-updating), consistent with the 2020 CPI manual guidelines.
- Production system and software:
  - PPI introduced a new production system in 2023 based on month-to-month calculations and Python open-source code, replacing Excel spreadsheets.
  - CPI staff are partly familiar with short-term methodology but feel uncomfortable with Python and have limited internal support; reluctant to implement similar system for CPI in short run.
  - Mission: a new production system should not be top priority for CPI; many methodological steps should precede system overhaul.
  - CPI calculation system currently based on Excel spreadsheets; while Excel is error-prone, Seychelles’ national index is less complex and manageable in Excel.
- Lower-level calculations:
  - Geometric mean used at elementary aggregate (EA) level to aggregate varieties’ prices across outlets/markets.
  - Prices for fresh fruit and vegetables, fresh fish, and petrol are measured weekly; monthly price mainly calculated by geometric average of weekly prices with some exceptions.
  - NBS advised to use geometric average consistently at lower levels.
- Recommended Actions:
  - Use short-term relatives and monthly chaining instead of fixed long-term relatives for index compilations.
  - Calculate and compare the Modified Young index with official index for a period of at least six months.
  - Use the geometric average on lower levels consistently.

### E. Missing Prices, Imputed Prices, and Variety Replacements
- Current practice:
  - Temporarily missing prices are partly treated by carrying forward the last reported price.
  - NBS does not perform quality adjustment in compilations.
  - When a variety disappears, NBS seeks a variety replacement as similar as possible; no adjustment made for different quality of compared varieties.
- Issues identified:
  - Carrying forward last reported price is not “neutral” and typically introduces a downward bias into the index.
  - Lack of quality adjustment and selective replacement of varieties can reduce representativity and credibility of the CPI.
  - Short-term relatives and an updated compilation system would facilitate inclusion of more representative varieties.
- Recommended approach:
  - Temporarily missing prices should be imputed and imputed values stored and flagged in the compilation system.
  - Imputed prices should reflect change rates of other similar varieties (within the same EA) rather than carry-forward of last price.
- Recommended Action:
  - Do not carry forward last reported price for varieties that are missing but base the imputed price on the change rates of other similar varieties.

### CPI publication, classification, and dissemination
- The NBS publishes an extensive monthly CPI bulletin with indices and change rates mainly at COICOP division level; for the food category they break it further down to class level.
- The NBS also uses a separate broader national-specific classification consisting of the aggregated groups of “Fish,” “Other food,” and “Non-food.”
- The COICOP aggregate for fish only includes conserved and canned fish and not fresh fish; “Fresh fish” is included only in the “Fish” aggregate outside the COICOP classification.
- The CPI bulletin includes figures on contributions to the month-on-month changes and to year-on-year changes calculated according to good international recommendations.

### Core inflation, headline measurement, and transparency
- Core inflation and headline measurement:
  - NBS publishes a core inflation index based on the exclusion method; in Seychelles this core index excludes fresh fish and energy products like fuel and electricity.
  - NBS also publishes the exclusion component in the monthly CPI bulletin; the mission advised that this index dissemination could be stopped as it is expected to be of limited use for such a mixed measurement.
  - The mission questioned the need for publishing quarterly indices given that the CPI is a monthly indicator and recommended considering excluding quarterly indices in the CPI bulletin if not driven by specific user needs.
- Official headline definition and recommended practice:
  - Current practice: the CPI monthly bulletin places more emphasis on the 12-month rolling average as the headline inflation measurement while also publishing year-on-year change rates.
  - The 12-month rolling average is defined as a rolling average of the last 12 months compared to the average of the same periods in the previous year; it covers a broader period and smoothens developments over time.
  - Recommendation: Define the official inflation measurement as the year-on-year change rate and underline this in the monthly CPI bulletin, because a headline inflation measurement should not adjust or smoothen the development. A 12-month rolling average is more suited as an analytical data series than as the official inflation measurement.
- Transparency and methodological documentation:
  - There is very limited information available on the methodology used in the Seychellois index.
  - Recommendation: Make methodological documentation available for users on the current methodology and on methodological changes when they are made.

### Owner-occupied housing (OOH), rentals, and price collection guidance
- OOH and rental measurement:
  - Current coverage: only actual rentals are covered (imputed rentals are not); over 70 percent of Seychellois households are homeowners (HBS 2018/19).
  - Given the high share of homeowners, a measure of owner-occupied housing (OOH) should be considered to acknowledge costs related to owning a home; implementation of OOH will have lower priority given the wide scope of changes proposed.
- Rental survey design and sample recommendations:
  - The rental survey struggles with high non-response; the NBS approaches tenants to collect rent.
  - The rental market is heterogeneous with many different types of landlords, including a high share of private households acting as landlords.
  - Current practice: the rental survey is split into two subsamples with rents collected from the same household samples every second month.
  - Suggested approach: use a larger sample split into several smaller subsamples to preserve monthly changes and reduce response burden through more infrequent re-contact.
  - Example calculation note: the monthly rent change obtained is the geometric average of the total change rate; if one splits the sample into six subsamples, the monthly change is the sixth root of the sum of the sample rent of current period to the corresponding sample rent of previous period.
  - Recommendation: establish a larger rental sample based on incoming HBS results and create a list of back-up rented units for replacements.
- Price collection frequency and discounts:
  - Data collection frequency varies across durables, non‑durables, and services; some semi-durable goods (e.g., clothing) are measured quarterly rather than monthly.
  - Recommendation: check regularly the plausibility of prices for items collected less frequently than monthly; if prices show stronger fluctuation than expected, increase the price collection frequency.
  - Current practice: the CPI does not generally collect discount prices because many promotions are linked to varieties leaving the market with potential quality deterioration and low sales volumes.
  - Recommendation: include centrally displayed promotion/sale prices in the index when they are likely linked to high sales volumes and the quality does not change; discounts should be recorded when these conditions hold.
  - Note: this area would benefit from additional training for data collectors.

### Recommended Actions (from the mission)
- Include all EA indices of the CPI in the COICOP classification.
- Remove quarterly figures and the exclusion component from the very extensive monthly CPI bulletin.
- Underline in the monthly CPI bulletin that the official inflation rate should be defined by the year-on-year change rates.
- Make methodological notes on the CPI available for users.
- Increase the sample of rented dwellings and use several subsamples to reduce the response burden of tenants; create a back-up list for replacements.
- Make checks of prices of products that are collected less frequently than monthly to verify whether the data collection frequency is still valid.
- Include sales prices if linked to high sales volumes.

### Officials met during the mission
- Mrs. Li Fa Cheung Kai Suet, Chief Executive Officer, NBS
- Mrs. Kirsten Arnephy, Senior Statistician, Prices unit, NBS
- Ms. Rebeka Labiche, Statistician, Prices unit, NBS
- Ms Virginie Hoareau, Statistician, National Accounts, NBS
- Mr Burny Payet, Statistician, National Accounts, NBS
- Ms Neela Ernesta, Statistician, National Accounts, NBS
- Mr Kevin Bistoquet, Counterpart to the CEO, NBS
- Tania Pouponneau, Statistician, Social Statistics, NBS
- Ryan Madeleine, Statistician, Social Statistics, NBS
- Mr. Naadir Hassan, Minister of Finance, National Planning and Trade of Seychelles
- Ministry of Finance, National Planning and Trade of Seychelles

*IMF | AFRITAC South Technical Assistance Report – Seychelles Consumer Price Index Mission — Section I. Detailed Technical Assessment and Recommendations*

### Section I. Detailed Technical Assessment and Recommendations ................................................ 5

### tarea2024059-print-pdf - Section I. Detailed Technical Assessment and Recommendations ................................................ 5

### Summary of Mission Outcomes and Priority Recommendations
- A technical assistance (TA) mission on the Consumer Price Index (CPI), sponsored by IMF AFRITAC South (AFS), was conducted during April 22–26, 2024 to the National Bureau of Statistics of Seychelles (NBS).
- Objectives: assess current CPI methodology and identify areas for improvement, including assisting NBS with planning of the CPI update. Main output: a detailed work plan guiding NBS.
- Key assessments:
  - CPI broadly follows international guidelines and good practices, but methodological improvements are needed.
  - NBS is small with high staff turnover, dependence on few key personnel, and lacks internal documentation of CPI production routines.
  - Current CPI uses weights from HBS 2018/19; these weights are likely outdated.
  - A new HBS is planned to be launched in June/July 2024 for a 12-month period (HBS 2024/25).
  - CPI currently compiles a direct fixed basket index (prices compared to average of 2020) and is chained to long-term series with index reference period 2014=100; last update did not change index reference period.
  - Mission recommended a Modified (short-term) Young index emphasizing month-to-month chaining; recommended in the CPI Manual (2020).
- Mission emphasis:
  - Timely introduction of new weights to avoid implementing “old” expenditure data.
  - Plan and implement changes gradually given limited resources.
  - NBS requested further CPI assistance for the broad scope of advised changes.

- Priority Recommendations (as presented in the source table):
  - July 2025: Make experimental chained short-term (month-to-month) relatives by calculating the Modified Young index and compare current and new methodology for a period of at least six months. — Responsible: NBS
  - November 2025: Develop CPI weights based on COICOP 2018 and HBS 2024/25. — Responsible: NBS
  - February 2026: Implement new methodology for CPI including new weight, price and index reference period and a new classification standard. — Responsible: NBS

### A. Organization and Resources
- Institutional responsibility:
  - NBS of Seychelles compiles national CPI. Economic Statistics Section covers CPI, PPI, Industrial Production Index, National Accounts, and more.
- Staffing and capacity:
  - CPI central staff: two people responsible for central data collection, compilation, analysis, and dissemination.
  - Field data collectors: less than 10 people involved in data collection.
  - Head office CPI staff also work on other statistics like PPI and Employment.
  - CPI field staff have limited training in CPI-specific procedures and concepts; need for increased CPI knowledge in data collection, price concept, item replacements, and item specifications.
  - Head office CPI staff lack experience and capacity concerning a CPI update; they were not directly involved in the 2020/21 update.
- Risks and recommendations:
  - High staff turnover and no internal documentation → CPI vulnerable to staff changes.
  - Mission created and discussed a template for internal documentation.
  - Recommended: document CPI production routines and methodology to ensure CPI quality and continuity.

### B. Scope and Purpose
- Coverage and principles:
  - CPI relates to entire territory and covers all income groups; follows resident principle (expenditure of resident households included; expenditure of residents spent abroad excluded).
  - Nonresidents (tourists) and non-monetary expenditures (e.g., owner-occupied housing (OOH)) are excluded.
  - Price collection covers islands Mahe, Praslin and La Digue where 98.9 percent of the population resides (HBS 2018/19).
- Uses:
  - All-item CPI used for indexation of wages and as main inflation indicator for monetary policy.
  - NBS also disseminates a Harmonized Index of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) with definitions that may differ from national index.

### C. Update of the CPI of Seychelles
- Current status:
  - CPI compiled on weights from HBS 2018/19; previous update implemented January 2021.
  - NBS plans HBS 2024/25: planned launch June/July 2024; 12-month fielding period. Pilot survey run by Social Statistics to evaluate questionnaires and response rates.
  - Sample design changed since previous survey: plan to use both diary reporting and prefilled forms.
  - Discussion on including COICOP 2018 classification in HBS; unclear if achieved.
- Recommendations and timing:
  - Mission recommended implementing COICOP 2018 in CPI regardless of final HBS decisions; otherwise NBS may wait another five to seven years to adopt new standard.
  - Mission planned implementation of updated CPI in January 2026, but stressed dependency on HBS data; with further delays, implementation may be January 2027.
  - Importance of minimizing lag between weight reference period (2024/25) and CPI implementation to avoid outdated “new” weights.
  - COICOP 2018 adds complexity: HBS data needs reclassification and back data series calculation; users will request comparable series.
  - Mission recommended reaggregating indices 2021–2025 by using COICOP 2018 based on current weights and current sample of goods and services.
  - NBS should be aware of deviations between official series with COICOP 1999 and new series with COICOP 2018; official back data period will remain 2014=100 series.
  - Advised to “un-chain” 2014=100 series by using the 2020=100 figures in back data aggregation.
  - Recommended to change the index reference period to the year before implementation (e.g., if implementation January 2026, set 2025=100) to alert users to breaks in the series.
  - For timely introduction of weights, obtain preliminary HBS figures to start identifying products and pricing, and coding to COICOP 2018.
  - Recommended annual overlap linking new CPI basket to old one.
- Recommended Actions:
  - Reduce the time lag between weight and price reference period as much as possible to introduce timely expenditure data.
  - Plan and execute the CPI update according to the detailed work plan made during mission.

### D. Index Calculations
- Current methodology:
  - NBS calculates a direct fixed basket price index comparing current prices to average prices of 2020 (2020=100).
  - Index reference period was not updated during the 2021 update; series are chained with a fixed linking factor (December 2020 index) monthly to achieve long-term index 2014=100.
  - In practice, despite being chained, the index behaves as a fixed basket index.
  - It was not possible to determine whether weights in the 2021 update were price-updated.
- Regional indices and stratification:
  - No regional or island-specific indices are calculated; prices from Mahe, Praslin and La Digue are grouped together with no further stratification.
- Recommended methodological change:
  - Introduce a Modified Young index (demonstrated during mission): a monthly chained index (previous month as price reference) to increase flexibility for matching samples, resampling, treatment of missing prices, and quality adjustments.
  - Young index keeps expenditure shares from HBS (no price-updating), consistent with the 2020 CPI manual guidelines.
- Production system and software:
  - PPI introduced a new production system in 2023 based on month-to-month calculations and Python open-source code, replacing Excel spreadsheets.
  - CPI staff are partly familiar with short-term methodology but feel uncomfortable with Python and have limited internal support; reluctant to implement similar system for CPI in short run.
  - Mission: a new production system should not be top priority for CPI; many methodological steps should precede system overhaul.
  - CPI calculation system currently based on Excel spreadsheets; while Excel is error-prone, Seychelles’ national index is less complex and manageable in Excel.
- Lower-level calculations:
  - Geometric mean used at elementary aggregate (EA) level to aggregate varieties’ prices across outlets/markets.
  - Prices for fresh fruit and vegetables, fresh fish, and petrol are measured weekly; monthly price mainly calculated by geometric average of weekly prices with some exceptions.
  - NBS advised to use geometric average consistently at lower levels.
- Recommended Actions:
  - Use short-term relatives and monthly chaining instead of fixed long-term relatives for index compilations.
  - Calculate and compare the Modified Young index with official index for a period of at least six months.
  - Use the geometric average on lower levels consistently.

### E. Missing Prices, Imputed Prices, and Variety Replacements
- Current practice:
  - Temporarily missing prices are partly treated by carrying forward the last reported price.
  - NBS does not perform quality adjustment in compilations.
  - When a variety disappears, NBS seeks a variety replacement as similar as possible; no adjustment made for different quality of compared varieties.
- Issues identified:
  - Carrying forward last reported price is not “neutral” and typically introduces a downward bias into the index.
  - Lack of quality adjustment and selective replacement of varieties can reduce representativity and credibility of the CPI.
  - Short-term relatives and an updated compilation system would facilitate inclusion of more representative varieties.
- Recommended approach:
  - Temporarily missing prices should be imputed and imputed values stored and flagged in the compilation system.
  - Imputed prices should reflect change rates of other similar varieties (within the same EA) rather than carry-forward of last price.
- Recommended Action:
  - Do not carry forward last reported price for varieties that are missing but base the imputed price on the change rates of other similar varieties.

### F. Dissemination
- (Content for this subsection appears in the source but is not included verbatim in the supplied extract up to this point.)

### G. Other Discussions and Recommendations
- NBS requested further CPI assistance on the wide scope of advised changes.
- Mission stressed the importance of gradual implementation and careful planning to avoid overburdening CPI staff who must continue publishing official figures while developing methodology.
- The mission provided a template for internal documentation and emphasized training needs for CPI staff and field data collectors.

### H. Officials Met During the Mission
- (Listing of officials met appears in the source table of contents but specific names/positions are not included in the supplied extract.)

*IMF | AFRITAC South Technical Assistance Report – Seychelles Consumer Price Index Mission — Section I. Detailed Technical Assessment and Recommendations*

### 27.        The NBS publishes an extensive monthly CPI bulletin. The current Seychellois index

### tarea2024059-print-pdf - 27.        The NBS publishes an extensive monthly CPI bulletin. The current Seychellois index

### CPI publication, classification, and dissemination
- The NBS publishes an extensive monthly CPI bulletin with indices and change rates mainly at COICOP division level; for the food category they break it further down to class level.
- The NBS also uses a separate broader national-specific classification consisting of the aggregated groups of “Fish,” “Other food,” and “Non-food.”
- The COICOP aggregate for fish only includes conserved and canned fish and not fresh fish; “Fresh fish” is included only in the “Fish” aggregate outside the COICOP classification.
- The CPI bulletin includes figures on contributions to the month-on-month changes and to year-on-year changes calculated according to good international recommendations.

### Core inflation and headline measurement
- The NBS publishes a core inflation index based on the exclusion method; in Seychelles this core index excludes fresh fish and energy products like fuel and electricity.
- The NBS also publishes the exclusion component in the monthly CPI bulletin; the mission advised that this index dissemination could be stopped as it is expected to be of limited use for such a mixed measurement.
- The mission questioned the need for publishing quarterly indices given that the CPI is a monthly indicator and recommended considering excluding quarterly indices in the CPI bulletin if not driven by specific user needs.

### Official headline definition and recommended practice
- Current practice: the CPI monthly bulletin places more emphasis on the 12-month rolling average as the headline inflation measurement while also publishing year-on-year change rates.
- The 12-month rolling average is defined as a rolling average of the last 12 months compared to the average of the same periods in the previous year; it covers a broader period and smoothens developments over time.
- Recommendation: Define the official inflation measurement as the year-on-year change rate and underline this in the monthly CPI bulletin, because a headline inflation measurement should not adjust or smoothen the development. A 12-month rolling average is more suited as an analytical data series than as the official inflation measurement.

### Transparency and methodological documentation
- There is very limited information available on the methodology used in the Seychellois index.
- Recommendation: Make methodological documentation available for users on the current methodology and on methodological changes when they are made.

### Owner-occupied housing (OOH) and rental measurement
- Current coverage: only actual rentals are covered (imputed rentals are not); over 70 percent of Seychellois households are homeowners (HBS 2018/19).
- Given the high share of homeowners, a measure of owner-occupied housing (OOH) should be considered to acknowledge costs related to owning a home; implementation of OOH will have lower priority given the wide scope of changes proposed.

### Rental survey design and sample recommendations
- The rental survey struggles with high non-response; the NBS approaches tenants to collect rent.
- The rental market is heterogeneous with many different types of landlords, including a high share of private households acting as landlords.
- Current practice: the rental survey is split into two subsamples with rents collected from the same household samples every second month.
- Suggested approach: use a larger sample split into several smaller subsamples to preserve monthly changes and reduce response burden through more infrequent re-contact.
- Example calculation note: the monthly rent change obtained is the geometric average of the total change rate; if one splits the sample into six subsamples, the monthly change is the sixth root of the sum of the sample rent of current period to the corresponding sample rent of previous period.
- Recommendation: establish a larger rental sample based on incoming HBS results and create a list of back-up rented units for replacements.

### Price collection frequency and discounts
- Data collection frequency varies across durables, non‑durables, and services; some semi-durable goods (e.g., clothing) are measured quarterly rather than monthly.
- Recommendation: check regularly the plausibility of prices for items collected less frequently than monthly; if prices show stronger fluctuation than expected, increase the price collection frequency.
- Current practice: the CPI does not generally collect discount prices because many promotions are linked to varieties leaving the market with potential quality deterioration and low sales volumes.
- Recommendation: include centrally displayed promotion/sale prices in the index when they are likely linked to high sales volumes and the quality does not change; discounts should be recorded when these conditions hold.
- Note: this area would benefit from additional training for data collectors.

### Recommended Actions (from the mission)
- Include all EA indices of the CPI in the COICOP classification.
- Remove quarterly figures and the exclusion component from the very extensive monthly CPI bulletin.
- Underline in the monthly CPI bulletin that the official inflation rate should be defined by the year-on-year change rates.
- Make methodological notes on the CPI available for users.
- Increase the sample of rented dwellings and use several subsamples to reduce the response burden of tenants; create a back-up list for replacements.
- Make checks of prices of products that are collected less frequently than monthly to verify whether the data collection frequency is still valid.
- Include sales prices if linked to high sales volumes.

### Officials met during the mission
- Mrs. Li Fa Cheung Kai Suet, Chief Executive Officer, NBS
- Mrs. Kirsten Arnephy, Senior Statistician, Prices unit, NBS
- Ms. Rebeka Labiche, Statistician, Prices unit, NBS
- Ms Virginie Hoareau, Statistician, National Accounts, NBS
- Mr Burny Payet, Statistician, National Accounts, NBS
- Ms Neela Ernesta, Statistician, National Accounts, NBS
- Mr Kevin Bistoquet, Counterpart to the CEO, NBS
- Tania Pouponneau, Statistician, Social Statistics, NBS
- Ryan Madeleine, Statistician, Social Statistics, NBS
- Mr. Naadir Hassan, Minister of Finance, National Planning and Trade of Seychelles
- Ministry of Finance, National Planning and Trade of Seychelles

*IMF | AFRITAC South Technical Assistance Report – Seychelles Consumer Price Index Mission*

---


_Source: https://www.imf.org/-/media/files/publications/tar/2024/english/tarea2024059-print-pdf.pdf_