Upward trend: Consumer price inflation is expected to grow further, but overall price pressure will likely remain moderate.

The Composite Consumer Price Index rose 1.6% in September over the same month last year, and was also up on August's 1.4% increase, the Census & Statistics Department says.

As the increase in private housing rents enlarges, and the rise in Towngas charges resulting from the fuel cost variation charge adjustment, the CPI rise widened slightly.

The climb in consumer price inflation continued, in tandem with the increasingly entrenched economic recovery and the gradual feed-through of higher private housing rents for fresh lettings into the CPI rental component.

Consumer price inflation is expected to move up further, along with the gradual rise-back in private housing rentals and in business costs and with the further pass-through of higher oil prices to the retail level. But overall price pressure will likely remain moderate through to year's-end.

Analysed by sub-index and on a year-on-year comparison, the CPI(A), CPI(B) and CPI(C) rose 1.5%, 1.7% and 1.7% in September, also larger than the corresponding increases of 1.3%, 1.4% and 1.5% in August.

Amongst the CPI components, year-on-year rises in prices were recorded for electricity, gas and water (4.1% in the Composite CPI), miscellaneous goods (2.9%), food - excluding meals bought away from home (2.4%), clothing and footwear (2.1%), transport (2.1%), housing (1.6%), meals bought away from home (1.2%), miscellaneous services (1.2%) and alcohol and tobacco (0.4%).

Year-on-year falls were recorded for durable goods (-1.6% in the Composite CPI).

For the three-month period ending September, the average monthly rates of change in the seasonally adjusted Composite CPI was 0.1%, same as that of the three-month period ending August.