November 30, 2011

Food prices in China started to pick up in the week ending November 27 after decline for six weeks running, the Ministry of Commerce (MOC) said Tuesday (Nov 29).

The wholesale price of pork dropped 1% from the previous week and had accumulatively slumped 10.7% since the middle of September. Prices of beef and mutton respectively rose 0.4% and 0.6% while chicken prices kept unchanged with the preceding week. Prices of eight major aquatic products edged up 0.9% on-week.

Price of eggs continued decline on sufficient feedstock. The national average retail price of egg fell back below 10 yuan/kilogram in November 21-27, down 1 %. Total decline in the past two month amounted to 5 %, according to MOC.

Average wholesale prices for 18 types of vegetables continued to rise for three weeks in a row and added 3% last week. Vegetable prices had climbed 4.9% since the beginning of November.

Retail prices of grain stayed stable last week while cooking oil prices rose moderately.

Food prices account for nearly one third weight in the basket of goods in the nation's CPI calculation. China's October CPI growth marked the slowest surge since May this year, softening to 5.5% on-year from 6.1% in September, with food prices moving up 11.9% from a year earlier.