Euro area annual inflation was 1.8% in January 2017, up from 1.1% in December 2016. In January 2016 the rate was 0.3%. EU annual inflation was 1.7% in January 2017, up from 1.2% in December. A year earlier the rate was 0.3%. These figures come from Eurostat, the statistical office of the EU. In January 2017, the lowest annual rates were registered in Ireland (0.2%), Romania (0.3%) and Bulgaria (0.4%). The highest annual rates were recorded in Belgium (3.1%), Latvia and Spain (both 2.9%), and Estonia (2.8%). Compared with December 2016, annual inflation fell in two Member States and rose in twenty-six. The largest upward impacts to euro area annual inflation came from fuels for transport (+0.50 percentage points), heating oil and vegetables (+0.14 pp each), while telecommunications (-0.09 pp), gas (-0.08 pp) and bread & cereals (-0.05 pp) had the biggest downward impacts.