OREANDA-NEWS. The National Bank of Belarus (NBB) has upgraded the inflation forecast for 2014 from 11% to 16-17%, the NBB chairwoman Nadezhda Yermakova told.

At the start of the year the Belarusian government had counted on being able to restrain inflation growth within 11% in 2014. Now the authorities believe consumer prices will grow by some 16-17% in 2014, Yermakova said.

At the same time, she admitted that high inflation growth prevents Belarus from conducting a redenomination of its home currency. “It is preferable that redenomination should be conducted when inflation growth is represented with a one-digit figure. The time is not ripe,” Yermakova said.

A premature redenomination will call for a repetition after a short while, the NBB chief said.