The prices that Dutch industrial companies ask for their goods were 1.9 percent higher in March than in the same month last year. The price increase has therefore leveled off for the ninth month in a row, the Central Bureau of Statistics reports. In February, prices were still more than 8 percent higher than one year previously, and in January prices were over 11 percent higher. Since July 2022, the increase in output prices has leveled off continuously.
The price increases are mainly due to increased costs for energy, raw materials and transport. According to the statistics office, the war in Ukraine is putting extra pressure on prices. And that price pressure comes on top of the price increases that arose earlier due to the rapid recovery of the economy after the corona crisis.
Manufacturing output prices are closely related to oil prices. In March, a barrel of Brent crude oil cost almost 74 euros. That was 27 percent less than a year earlier. In February, a barrel of Brent oil cost about 78 euros, almost 6 percent less than a year earlier.
Prices in most industrial classes were higher in March than a year earlier. In the petroleum industry, the price level was more than 21 percent lower than a year ago, and prices in the chemical industry fell by more than 4 percent due to the lower oil prices.
