China's consumer price index (CPI), a major gauge of inflation, is expected to rebound as prices of staple food rise amid the coldest winter in 28 years, analysts said Sunday.
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"Factors such as cold weather and greater demand for food during the Spring Festival in mid-February may push the CPI reading in the first quarter of 2013 back above the 2 percent threshold," Chris Leung, senior China economist at DBS Bank Hong Kong, wrote in a report sent to the Global Times Sunday.
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Prices of major vegetables and pork rose in November and December 2012, according to the Ministry of Commerce's price monitoring system.
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China is also suffering the coldest winter in 28 years, according to the China Meteorological Administration. Along with the rising cost of food transportation as a result of the cold weather, increased demand for meat during holiday occasions is also pushing up prices.
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China's CPI rose 1.7 percent year-on-year in October 2012, a two-year low, before rising slightly to 2 percent in November.Â
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The official statistics for December's CPI will not be available until Friday, but the average forecast is 2.3 percent, according to a recent survey by the Xinhua News Agency.