Farm produce prices still rising: MOC

Prices for farm produce continued to gain during the week ending on Jan. 20 due to shrinking supplies affected by smoggy weather, the Ministry of Commerce said Monday.

Wholesale prices for 18 vegetables monitored in 36 major cities climbed 1.9 percent from Jan. 14 to 20, with average prices for onion, cowpea and green pepper up 5.7 percent, 5.1 percent and 3.9 percent, respectively, the ministry said in an online report.

The growth marked the 12th straight week of price increases, data showed.

Meanwhile, the wholesale price for pork, a staple meat, increased 1.1 percent week on week. The rise was 1 percentage point lower than last week's growth rate, the report showed.

The retail price for eggs edged up 0.4 percent in the past week, while eight types of aquatic products each went up 0.8 percent, the ministry said.

The growth has mainly been attributed to decreased supplies resulting from continuous smog that enveloped multiple Chinese cities last week, as well as a decrease in cultivation area for potatoes and white turnips, according to the distribution productivity promotion center of China commerce.

Food prices, which account for about one-third of the prices used to calculate the consumer price index (CPI), triggered rising inflation this winter.

The country's CPI grew 2.5 percent year on year in December, up from 2.0 percent in November and 1.7 percent in October, bringing the full-year increase to 2.6 percent, according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics.