Higher food prices fuelled a rise in Chinese inflation in March, while the pace of deflation in producer prices moderated from the previous month.
The official consumer price index rose 2.3 per cent year-on-year in March, according to China’s National Bureau of Statistics, coming in just below expectations of 2.4 per cent among analysts surveyed. Consumer prices had risen at the same rate in February, accelerating from 1.8 per cent in January.
Despite a fall in transport and communications prices thanks to persistently low commodity prices, the headline figure was kept aloft in March partly by rising food prices, with fresh vegetable prices rising 35.8 per cent year-on-year to add 0.92 percentage points to the headline figure, while pork prices were up 28.4 per cent, contributing 0.64 percentage points.