China farm produce prices continue to rise

BEIJING - Prices of farm produce in China continued to rise last week, with the overall price going up 0.8 percent, data from the Ministry of Commerce showed.

The average wholesale price of 30 types of vegetables rose 0.6 percent. The wholesale price of pork went up 2 percent, and the price of eggs edged up 1.7 percent from the previous week.

Food accounts for about one-third of China's consumer price index.

The data also showed that producer prices went up 0.2 percent last week, with prices of aluminum and zinc rising 1.4 percent and 0.9 percent from a week earlier.

The consumer price index, a main gauge of inflation, rose 1.5 percent year-on-year in February, compared with 1.7 percent growth in January. The producer price index, which measures costs for goods at the factory gate, edged up 0.1 percent year-on-year in February, data from the National Bureau of Statistics showed.