Executive Summary

• Syria’s Consumer Price Index (CPI) rose by 1.8 per cent in August 2026 compared with July, from 991.5 to 1008.9 points. It approached its June level after July’s decline. Prices rose in nine consumption groups and fell in tobacco and recreation and culture. The general price level remained around 26 per cent above August 2025 and exceeded ten times its level in the 2021 base year, confirming continued pressure on household purchasing power.
• Food and non-alcoholic beverages; housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels; and transport led the increase, contributing approximately 0.824, 0.521 and 0.319 percentage points respectively. Food and non-alcoholic beverage prices rose by 2.7 per cent, with increases in meat, dairy products, eggs, pulses and vegetables. Transport rose by 4.8 per cent. Inflation was thus concentrated in basic needs on which households find it difficult to cut spending without affecting their diets, mobility and access to services.
• Rising household needs coincided with a cut in industrial fuel oil prices, while some wheat and cotton producers continued to face payment delays. This shows how economic policy affects groups differently: enterprises may benefit from a cheaper input, while farmers bear the cost of waiting for payment and financing their obligations. Transport development and financial sector modernisation offer future opportunities, but their effects depend on implementation and access to services. Who benefits, and when those benefits reach them, therefore needs to be monitored.
• The average parallel-market USD exchange rate fell from approximately SYP 13215 in July to SYP 13171 in August, or 0.3 per cent, although it rose by 0.5 per cent between the start and end of August. The remittance rate remained at SYP 12250 per USD. The average USD rate against the Turkish lira (TL) rose by 2.4 per cent. Inflation measured in TL reached 3.5 per cent in Idleb and 2.5 per cent in Aleppo countryside, above the rate in Türkiye. This shows how currency movements and imports interact with supply conditions and local costs in Syria.
• Spatial price dispersion varied markedly across consumption groups. Housing, water, electricity and fuels had the highest unweighted mean of item-level coefficients of variation at 0.460, followed by education and health at approximately 0.404 and 0.403. Communications recorded around 0.041. These values reflect geographical differences in item prices within each group and confirm differences in the cost of basic needs and services.
• The household abject poverty line reached approximately SYP 3.46 million per month, the lower line SYP 5.44 million and the upper line SYP 7.51 million. A public sector university graduate’s wage covered only 43.5 per cent of the abject poverty line, compared with 78.5 per cent for a shop worker. A civil society university graduate’s wage slightly exceeded the lower line but remained below the upper line. These findings underline the need to link wage and social protection policies to local living costs, expedite payments to producers, and ensure that easier access to energy, finance and trade improves household incomes and their ability to meet their needs.

Categories: August, Bulletins, Monthly Bulletins, Monthly Bulletins 2026, Publication

Tags: August, Monthly Bulletin on Consumer Prices and Inflation in Syria, SCPR, Syria