China's economic planner plays down pork inflation fears

BEIJING - Pork prices in China will continue to run high, but will not rise remarkably this year, the country's economic planner said on Sunday.

This round of price hike resulted from low prices in previous years, said the National Development and Reform Commission's website.

Some farmers are reluctant to raise pigs after suffering low prices for years, even if the prices have actually been picking up, it said. Prices have been rising for about a year after almost three years of falls.

Pork is China's staple meat and its price is subject to a boom-and-bust cycle and the supply-demand relationship is expected to ease in September.

The average wholesale pork price hit 25.3 yuan ($3.9) per kg in the week ending on April 3, up 0.4 percent from the previous week, the highest since October 2011, according to the Ministry of Commerce.

The consumer price index (CPI) grew 2.3 percent in February from one year earlier, up from January's 1.8 percent.

Food prices, which account for a third of the CPI calculation, rose 7.3 percent year on year, while non-food inflation edged up 1 percent in February.

Pork prices jumped by 25.4 percent year on year in February, contributing 0.59 percentage points of CPI growth, while vegetable prices shot up by 30.6 percent, accounting for 0.86 percentage points of CPI growth.