Brasilia – The Brazil Commodities Index (IC-Br, in the Portuguese acronym), survey that follows the price of commodities (primary products with international rates), registered in February an increase of 4.97% over January. As the IC-Br had registered a drop of 5.14%, the accumulated period of the first two months of the year registers as a drop of 0.42%. The data was released this Wednesday (04) by the Brazilian Central Bank (BC).
The IC-Br index is calculated based in the price variation of primary products traded abroad. For this, the BC watches the products that are relevant for the dynamic of consumer price in Brazil.
Last month, the energy sector (oil, natural gas and coal) was the main culprit in higher prices, with an increase of 18.35% in the month. The metal sector (aluminum, iron ore, copper, tin, zinc, lead and nickel) had an increase of 4.19%.
The agricultural sector (beef, cotton, soybean oil, wheat, sugar, maize, coffee, rice and pork) registered an increase of 3.33% in the commodities index. These three segments reversed the January situation, when all of them had dropped in comparison to December.
The International Index of Commodities Prices (CRB), calculated by the Commodity Research Bureau, had an increase of 4.75% in February and of 0.57% year-to-date.
*Translated by Sérgio Kakitani
