DOHA: The cost of education in the country has shot up by a huge 9.1 percent in a year until last September, official figures show.
The rise is mainly due to goods and services related to education having become expensive, said the Ministry of Development Planning and Statistics.
Interestingly, the inflation in the education sector has surpassed escalating rents that shot up only 6.1 percent in the period.
Children’s education, thus, seems to be emerging as the biggest spoiler of household budgets of limited-income families.
Food prices show some reprieve but they have also inched up, albeit by a marginal 0.7 percent, year-on-year in September 2013, Ministry figures released yesterday suggest.
Thanks to the price escalation, the overall inflation in the country was 2.7 percent year-on-year in September, the Ministry said.
The above three heads of expenses (education, rent and food) can collectively account for more than half (56.3 percent) of a household’s monthly expenses in Qatar. Education is included in the category of ‘Entertainment, Recreation and Culture’ which has a weight of 10.9 percent in the Consumer Price Index (CPI) basket.
Rent that is clubbed with fuel and energy has the highest share in the CPI basket, at 32.2 percent. Food (clubbed with beverages and tobacco) has 13.2 percent weight.
Talking of the rising cost of “Entertainment, Recreation and Culture”, the Ministry said in a statement it was due to a hike in the prices of goods and services related to education.
About the rising rent, the Ministry statement said that resulted mainly due to an increase in the “rentals of residential buildings”.
Price increases have been registered in most of the groups, except in the case of “Miscellaneous goods and services” whose prices have plummeted 4.5 percent, the Ministry said.
Asked for comment, financial analyst Abdullah Al Khater described the rise in education costs as “too much and uncontrolled”.
House rents are shooting up driven by an increasing influx of foreign workers for the mega development projects, affecting almost every aspect of the country’s life and economy, he said.
