ACCRA, June 9 (Reuters) – Ghana’s consumer price inflation was at 7.5% year-on-year in May, down from 8.5% in the previous month, due to an ongoing decline in food inflation, the West African nation’s statistics service said on Wednesday.

The drop puts the rate within the Bank of Ghana’s targeted band of 8% plus or minus 2 percentage points for the second month in a row.

As in May, declining food inflation played the greatest role in reducing the overall inflation rate.

“Last month we saw food inflation was a strong contributing factor … around 50% to overall inflation, but since April 2021, we’ve seen its contribution drop to around a third,” Samuel Kobina Annim, the head of the statistics office, told a news conference.

Ghana’s central bank surprised the market last month by cutting its main policy rate to 13.5% from 14.5%, saying that inflation was expected to remain within the target band over the next quarter due to the reduction in food inflation.

(Reporting by Christian Akorlie Writing by Cooper Inveen Editing by Bate Felix and Catherine Evans)