Notable increases in fruit and pork prices have pushed up China’s consumer prices index in April, China Securities Journal reported.
In April, China’s CPI rose 2.5% year on year, marking a second consecutive month that the CPI grew by more than 2%. Food prices increased by 6.1% year on year, while non-food prices are up 1.7%, official data shows.
The increase in pork and fruit prices have contributed 0.31 percentage points and 0.22 percentage points to CPI growth in April.
For example, the wholesale price at Fuji Apple in China reached 10.33 yuan (US$1.5) per kilogram this week, up 60.7% from the same period last year, the report said, citing data from an official agricultural products price monitoring system.
Pork prices climbed by 14.4% year on year in April, mainly because of the impact of the outbreak of African swine fever.
Liu Aihua, spokesperson of China’s national statistics bureau, said that the fruit price hike is a result of extreme weather and is not likely to last.
Zhonghang Securities analyst Fu Yang said although further increases in pork prices are expected in May, the core CPI will remain stable in short term.