China maintains stable supplies, prices in April

China's factory-gate price rose in April at the slowest rate in a year as the government took steady steps to ensure stable supplies and prices amid international commodity price hikes, the National Bureau of Statistics said on Wednesday.

China's producer price index, which gauges factory-gate prices, increased 8.0 percent year-on-year in April, easing back from 8.3 percent in the previous month, the NBS said.

On a monthly basis, the PPI grew by 0.6 percent in April, compared with a 1.1 percent increase in the previous month.

China's consumer price index, a main gauge of inflation, rose by 2.1 percent year-on-year in April, the fastest pace in five months, after a gain of 1.5 percent in the previous month, the NBS data showed.

The faster growth of consumer inflation was mainly attributed to the increase in food prices with fresh vegetables, fresh fruits and eggs prices rising 24.0 percent, 14.1 percent and 13.3 percent year-on-year in April respectively.

Dong Lijuan, a senior NBS statistician, said that consumer inflation rose at a faster pace amid domestic COVID-19 cases and rising international commodity prices.

On a month-on-month basis, the CPI grew by 0.4 percent. The prices of potato foods, eggs and fresh fruits increased 8.8 percent, 7.1 percent and 5.2 percent respectively due to rising logistics costs and local citizens' increasing demand for stockpiling foods, according to the NBS.

The growth in core CPI, which excludes volatile food and energy prices and is deemed a better gauge of the supply-demand relationship in the economy, came in at 0.9 percent year-on-year in April, down from 1.1 percent in the previous month.

ouyangshijia@chinadaily.com.cn