Euro area annual inflation was 1.5% in August 2017, up from 1.3% in July 2017. In August 2016 the rate was 0.2%. European Union annual inflation was 1.7% in August 2017, up from 1.5% in July 2017. A year earlier the rate was 0.3%. These figures come from Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union. The lowest annual rates were registered in Ireland (0.4%), Cyprus (0.5%), Greece and Romania (both 0.6%). The highest annual rates were recorded in Lithuania (4.6%), Estonia (4.2%), and Latvia (3.2%). Compared with July 2017, annual inflation rose in twenty Member States, remained stable in five and fell in three.

The largest upward impacts to the euro area annual inflation came from fuels for transport (+0.16 percentage points), accommodation services (+0.10 pp) and air transport (+0.06 pp), while telecommunication (-0.12 pp), vegetables (-0.05 pp) and social protection (-0.04 pp) had the biggest downward impacts