inflation and depressing growth. the exit from the pandemic had already produced a sharp rise in energy and commodity prices. and the emergence of supply bottlenecks had raised the prices of durable goods. the russian invasion of ukraine is now exacerbating each of these individual forces. inflation rose to 8. 6 % in june. in particular, energy prices were 41. 9 % above their levels one year earlier and food prices were 8. 9 % higher. moreover, eurosystem staff revised their baseline inflation projections up significantly in june. they foresee annual inflation at 6. 8 % in 2022, 3. 5 % in 2023 and 2. 1 % in 2024. this surge in prices does not reflect excess demand in the euro area. consumption and investment remain below their pre - pandemic level and even further away from their pre - pandemic trend. with wages rising at a moderate pace, real incomes have been severely hit by the surge in import prices. together with the war, this is further depressing consumption and confidence, despite the boost they have received from the reopening after the pandemic. leading indicators of consumer confidence and business sentiment are deteriorating, and the growth outlook is being progressively revised downwards. our projections now foresee activity remaining below its pre - pandemic trend throughout our projection horizon. so how should monetary policy react to this situation? faced with persistently high inflation, we started a gradual process of policy normalisation at the end of last year. and at its meeting on 9 june the governing council decided to end net asset purchases under our asset purchase programme as of 1 july. we signalled that we intend to raise our policy rates by 25 basis points in july and that we expect to raise them again in september. as a result, there is already an adjustment working its way through the economy. nominal yields and real rates have seen a material increase in recent months. banks have started to tighten their credit conditions and expect to further tighten them markedly in the coming quarters. given the prevailing uncertainty, normalisation should remain gradual. for now, our aim should be to avoid high near - term imported inflation becoming entrenched by feeding into higher inflation expectations. and this is why we are ending the policies that sought to fend off deflationary dynamics, such as net asset purchases and negative rates. but beyond this, further adjustments to our monetary policy stance will depend on the evolution of the outlook for inflation and the economy.

area data compiled by eurostat and the nsis. in particular, the ecb attaches considerable importance to the reliability and timeliness of the so - called principal european economic indicators ( peeis ), which comprise the indicators for core consumer prices, national accounts, shortterm business, labour markets and external trade. in november of last year the ecofin council recognised that, in general, the timeliness targets set in 2002 had now been achieved for the majority of the peeis and invited eurostat and the ecb to review the scope, timeliness and quality of the peeis, also in the light of the evolving needs of users. this brings me to the important issue of the communication of statistics. the importance of the appropriate communication of statistics communication with the general public and financial markets is crucial for any central bank because it helps to enhance the effectiveness of monetary policy. euro area statistics play an important role in the ecb ’ s communication, and it is therefore of great importance to the ecb that these statistics be highly credible and very accessible. in total, the ecb publishes around 70 statistical press releases per year, including monthly monetary statistics and data on interest rates, securities and the balance of payments ; quarterly euro area accounts and statistics on investment funds and the international investment position ; and annual payment statistics and general data on monetary financial institutions. even more detailed and more frequent statistics are made available on the ecb ’ s website. in other to enhance the accessibility of its statistics, the ecb launched its online statistical data warehouse in 2006. maintaining the public ’ s confidence in the ecb statistics requires high quality standards. such standards were set out in a recently published framework governing the quality of ecb statistics. 8 in addition, in the performance of their statistical tasks, both the ecb and the ncbs adhere to the statistical principles and ethical and quality standards set out in their “ public commitment with respect to the escb ’ s statistical function ”. 9 the independence granted to the escb by the treaty means that there is no political interference in the see “ the introduction of harmonised competitiveness indicators for euro area countries ” in the february 2007 issue of the ecb ’ s monthly bulletin, and http : / / www. ecb. europa. eu / stats / exchange / hci / html / hci _ 200801. en. html. see “ review of statistics on payments and securities trading, clearing and settlement ” in the january 2008 issue of the ecb