MOSCOW, August 26 (RIA Novosti) — The Russian Ministry of Economic Development has recalculated its forecast for the country’s inflation rate for 2015 to 6.5 percent due to Western sanctions, the ministry’s Macroeconomic Forecasting Department director, Oleg Zasov, said Tuesday.
“We increased the prognosis on inflation for next year to 6.5 percent for the base scenario," Zasov said.
“[Western] sanctions against Russia and our country’s countermeasures played a defining role in this," the director said.
Zasov pointed out two key factors affecting inflation: price growth associated with sanctions and the introduction of a sales tax at the beginning of 2015.
According to Zasov, the ministry has not yet coordinated its adjusted inflation forecast with the Central Bank of Russia, which is currently revising its own estimates.
The ministry earlier predicted an inflation rate of 5 percent for 2015.
The ministry’s forecasts for inflation of 4.5 percent in 2016 and 4 percent in 2017 are unchanged.
