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Bolivia Inflation Trends (2026)
Year-on-year inflation rate development in early 2026
Primary Sources
Bolivia protests against President Paz widen with violent clashes ...
Bolivian protests calling for center-right President Rodrigo Paz to resign intensified Monday as demonstrators swarmed government buildings and a protest leader faced terrorism charges over the unrest. Riot police clashed with protesters for hours, tear gas shrouded the streets of La Paz, shops were shuttered and supplies ran low due to protest blockades choking routes into the capital city. Thousands of farmers, miners, teachers, workers from other sectors and Indigenous communities have led weeks-long protests calling for wage increases, economic stability and an end to the privatization of state-owned companies. The Andean nation is suffering its worst economic ordeal in the past four decades, with year-on-year inflation hitting 14 percent in April. Bolivian police clash with protesters blocking roads into La Paz To display this content from YouTube, you must enable advertisement tracking and audience measurement. One of your browser extensions seems to be blocking the video player from loading. To watch this content, you may need to disable it on this site. © France 24 01:44 While calm had largely returned to La Paz by Monday evening, those on the streets are furious with Paz, a conservative who assumed the presidency less than six months ago following two decades of socialist rule. He scrapped two-decade-old fuel subsidies that had drained the treasury's international dollar reserves, but so far he has failed to stabilize fuel supplies. "We want him to resign because he's incompetent. Bolivia is going through a moment of chaos," 60-year-old farmer Ivan Alarcon, who traveled around 90 kilometres (60 miles) from Caquiaviri in western Bolivia to protest, told AFP. Earlier Monday, riot police used tear gas to prevent protesting miners from entering La Paz's main square, where government buildings are located, while the demonstrators hurled explosives and stones back at them. Protests have paralyzed the Bolivian capital La Paz. © Aizar Raldes, AFP Images released by the government showed protesters looting an office and making off with furniture, computers, monitors and other equipment. Authorities have not reported any injuries, but AFP observed at least two wounded protesters. And while no official arrest tally has been released, television station Unitel reported more than 100 people were detained. 'Chaos' The public prosecutor said Monday it was issuing an arrest warrant for the leader of the country's largest union COB, accusing him of terroris...
Bolivia protests escalate as U.S. backs Paz government - UPI
Protesters block an avenue in El Alto, Bolivia, on Sunday. Photo by Gabriel Marquez/EPA May 18 (UPI) -- The United States expressed support for Bolivian President Rodrigo Paz as the country entered a third consecutive week of protests, road blockades and political tensions that have caused food, medicine and fuel shortages in several regions. In a statement published on X, the State Department's Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs strongly criticized what it described as actions aimed at destabilizing Bolivia's democratically elected government. "We condemn all actions aimed at destabilizing the democratically elected government of Rodrigo Paz Pereira," the office said. In Bolivia, riots and blockades have created a humanitarian crisis, causing shortages of medicine, food and fuel. We condemn all actions aimed at destabilizing the democratically elected government of @Rodrigo_PazP and support it in its efforts to restore order for the peace,...— Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs (@WHAAsstSecty) May 17, 2026 The U.S. statement came after Argentina, Chile, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Panama, Paraguay and Peru issued a joint declaration Friday rejecting "all actions aimed at destabilizing the democratic order" in Bolivia, according to Infobae. Bolivia's crisis began with protests led by labor unions and peasant organizations demanding wage increases and repeal of a law linked to agrarian property reforms. As the days passed, some demonstrations evolved into direct calls for Paz's resignation. Twenty-two active road blockades were reported across the country Monday, including 15 in the department of La Paz, the region most affected, the state-run Bolivian Highway Administration saud. Bolivian newspaper Diario Potosí also reported blockades in Oruro, Cochabamba and Santa Cruz, while new indefinite protests were expected to begin Tuesday in the department of Chuquisaca. The disruptions are affecting ground transportation, food distribution and industrial activity in different regions, while shortages and rising prices continue to worsen in La Paz. At the same time, supporters of former President Evo Morales were marching toward La Paz from the town of Caracollo, about 118 miles from the capital, demanding respect for the Constitution and an end to judicial proceedings against the former leader, according to Diario Potosí. Tensions escalated last week when cooperative miners clashed with police in downtown La Paz, using dynamite during protests linked ...
Bolivia Protests 2026: Why the Unrest Continues
Bolivia, which became a BRICS partner in 2024, has plunged into a new cycle of mass unrest, with street blockades and labor strikes spreading across its major cities in response to two controversial government proposals. Firstly, fuel cuts were enacted directly by the president as an executive decree in December 2025, and then a land measure was passed by congress as a formal law in April 2026 which triggered the protests we are witnessing. To grasp the scale of this confrontation, one must first understand the current administration in La Paz, the policy that triggered the uprising, the shape of the protest movement, and the internal political collapse that allowed a conservative government to return to power.Bolivian President Rodrigo Paz Pereira, a centrist-right with deep ties to Bolivia’s traditional conservative politics, having taken office in early November 2025, his administration was formed on the heels of a decisive electoral victory that ended nearly two decades of uninterrupted rule by the Movement Toward Socialism. Paz Pereira quickly moved to implement what he had presented as a necessary economic cure for the nation’s ailing finances, and it was his very first major policy action that set off a chain reaction of mass social unrest. The first trigger for the protests was a presidential decree issued on December 18 that eliminated the fuel subsidies which had been a cornerstone of Bolivian economic policy for more than twenty years.The second trigger for the current massive May 2026 protests is a piece of legislation that indigenous groups and peasant unions see as a direct assault on their ability to keep their land. Law 1720, enacted by the center right administration of President Rodrigo Paz, allowed small agricultural holdings to be reclassified as medium size properties and then used as collateral for commercial bank loans. While Bolivia’s government backed off completely from the land law it only partially modified the fuel decree. Following intense nationwide protests, President Rodrigo Paz signed a decree fully annulling the controversial land mortgaging law to protect rural and Indigenous territories. However, while the administration agreed to suspend and rewrite the broader austerity measures within the fuel decree, it refused to back down on the most contentious point: the elimination of fuel subsidies remains in place to combat the country’s fiscal deficit.The protests took shape with remarkable speed and coordination, initially ...
What's behind Bolivia's ongoing protests? - DW.com
Highways have been blocked for weeks, and now the situation is growing ever more tense in the city of La Paz, where Bolivia's government is based. Local journalists reported that demonstrators have begun detonating small charges of dynamite to express their discontent. Protesters have stormed public buildings and set up dozens of blockades, leading to fuel and food shortages and causing hospitals to run out of oxygen cylinders. Banks have closed as a precaution. Economists warn that the protests are plunging Bolivia ever deeper into crisis. The US State Department has even called the ongoing protests an "attempted coup." Bolivian police have used tear gas to disperse protests in recent daysImage: Claudia Morales/REUTERS How did Bolivia get to this point? Bolivia's economy has been struggling for some time. As a result of a weak export sector, the Bolivian state lacks foreign currency, which it urgently needs for fuel imports, among other things. After almost 20 years of socialist governance with strong state control over economic affairs under Presidents Evo Morales and Luis Arce, Bolivians voted for change in 2025. Ahead of the runoff election in October, the two right-leaning candidates promised economic reforms and greater market freedoms. Jorge Quiroga, who enjoyed considerable public support, wanted to put Bolivia back on track with a cash injection from the International Monetary Fund. Yet in the end, center-right lawmaker Rodrigo Paz, who had campaigned on a platform of state reform without outside help, won the presidential election. While his Christian Democratic PDC party won the necessary parliamentary majority to implement his reforms, experts predicted a challenging presidency before he even took office. In October, Christina Stolte of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation in La Paz warned that the PDC lacked ideological unity and allegiance to the new president. "The PDC does not guarantee the newly elected president any coherent party support in parliament, let alone disciplined voting along the lines he has set," she said. Mounting economic problems Years of foreign currency shortages and a pronounced import dependency have driven up Bolivia's debt ratio to 95% of gross domestic product. In late 2025, President Paz abolished petrol subsidies, causing fuel prices to almost double. While this first measure to consolidate the state budget was considered reasonable by observers, it proved painful for ordinary Bolivians. The president's s...
