ANKARA, Sept. 3 (Xinhua) -- Turkish annual inflation rate surged to 17.9 percent in August, hitting highest point since 2004, showed official data on Monday.
Consumer prices index (CPI) increased 17.9 percent in August from the same month in 2017, up from 15.85 percent in the previous month, according to the data released by the Turkish Statistical Institute.
On a monthly basis, the costs of transportation increased by 4.45 percent, miscellaneous goods and services increased by 5.85 percent, while the cost of food and non-alcoholic beverages kept slightly increase of 0.06 percent.
The fast year-on-year growth was in transportation section, with prices up 27.13 percent, followed by furnishings and household equipment rising 23.76 percent, food and non-alcoholic beverages surging 19.75 percent.
The lira, one of the worst-performing emerging market currencies which has plunged by 40 percent this year, weakened to 6.6850 against U.S. dollars as of 9.30 a.m. local time (0630GMT), compared with last week's closing rate of 6.5840.
