Uganda's central bank held its benchmark lending rate at 12 percent on Wednesday,
Annual headline inflation rose from 7.3 percent in August to 8.0 percent in September, mainly driven by higher food crop prices, increased to 16.2 percent in September from 12.9 percent in the previous month.
Real economic growth for 2012/13 has been revised by the Uganda Bureau of Statistics to 5.8 percent from the preliminary estimate of 5.1 percent.
Commercial bank’s lending to the private sector is starting to recover. Annual growth in bank credit stood as 9.1 percent in August, compared to 6.4 percent in June.
“Given that core inflation is forecast to fall back to the BoU policy target over the medium term, I believe that it is warranted to maintain a neutral monetary policy stance for this month," Bank of Uganda Governor Emmanuel Tumusiime said in the Monetary Policy Statement.
