Inflation in West Africa's eight-nation CFA franc zone surged to an annual 7.2 percent at the end of June, from 4.8 percent three months earlier, Ivory Coast's finance minister said on Friday. Rising world oil and food prices over the past two years have driven consumer inflation up around the world. “The indicators show this trend will continue to get even worse for the remainder of 2008,” Charles Koffi Diby, economy and finance minister of the region's biggest economy, Ivory Coast, said at the opening of a meeting in Mali of ministers from the West African CFA franc zone. “All the same it is satisfying to see macroeconomic measures taken by economies allowing the zone to advance in terms of growth, with growth around 3.9 percent in 2008 compared with 3.2 percent in 2007,” Diby said. Benin, Burkina Faso, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Mali, Niger, Senegal and Togo make up the Economic and Monetary Union of West African States (UEMOA).
