COLOMBO Sri Lanka's consumer price inflation rate eased to 0.8% year-on-year in September from 2.1% in August, the statistics department said on Monday.

The National Consumer Price Index captures broader retail price inflation and is released with a lag of 21 days every month.

Food prices fell 5.2% in September after declining 5.4% in August, from a year earlier, the Department of Census and Statistics said in a statement.

Prices for non-food items, however, climbed 5.9% in September after rising 9% year-on-year in August.

Sri Lanka experienced record high inflation after its economy was pummelled by the worst financial crisis in decades.

But since June, its inflation has come down sharply, partly due to the statistical base effect, but also helped by a stronger rupee currency, and improved harvests.

(Reporting by Uditha Jayasinghe in Colombo and Rama Venkat in Bengaluru; Editing by Bernadette Baum, Robert Birsel)