South Korea’s finance ministry said Monday that consumer inflation remained stable near the Bank of Korea’s 2% target in September, as food price pressures eased following the Chuseok holiday. The consumer price index rose 2.1% from a year earlier, unchanged from August, while prices for agricultural, livestock and fisheries products increased 1.9%, down sharply from the prior month when a heatwave had driven costs higher. Government data showed the average cost of holiday food baskets fell between 0.3% and 5% from last year, depending on survey source.

The finance ministry attributed the moderation to cost-of-living measures, including temporary tariff-rate quotas