China Inflation Modest — Except the Cost of Food

By Douglas A. McIntyre Published May 9, 6:45AM EDT

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Inflation problems continue to plague China, in large part because of the cost of food. That means one essential cut into discretionary income. And, in turn, the chances that China’s growth can be driven by its new middle class lessens somewhat. Otherwise, Chinese price increases have remained moderate, perhaps because a worldwide recession has undercut demand for its factory goods.

The Xinhua news agency reports on China’s inflation in April:

China’s consumer inflation slightly accelerated in April, but still within a mild range that leaves room for policymakers to fine-tune policies to support the tepid economic recovery, official data showed Thursday.

China’s consumer price index (CPI), a main gauge of inflation, grew 2.4 percent year on year in April, up from 2.1 percent in March but well below the year’s control target of 3.5 percent, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

The rise is largely in line with the market forecast of around 2.3 percent.

The NBS attributed the gain mainly to an unusual increase in vegetable prices during that month as low temperatures and scarce rainfalls disrupted supplies.

In April, food prices, which account for nearly one-third of weighting in China’s CPI, increased 4 percent year on year, with the prices of vegetables rising 5.9 percent, NBS data showed.

On a monthly basis, consumer prices in April edged up 0.2 percent.

About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.