Chinese vegetable and meat prices rise as year-end approaches

With the traditional Chinese New Year just around the corner, Chinese people are finding that they may have to spend twice as much on New Year’s Eve shopping this year as they did last year.

Bloomberg reported Feb. 4 that Wang Chunxia, a retiree from Baoji, Shaanxi Province, China, has started shopping for New Year’s Eve dinner for her Family of five. She worries that purchasing basic foods such as vegetables and meat may also cost a lot of money this year.

Ms. Wang said that the prices of vegetables, pork, fish and shrimp are all rising at the moment. She estimated that this year’s New Year’s Eve shopping may cost more than 1,000 yuan ($155), twice as much as last year and about the same as her monthly pension.

The Ministry of Agriculture and rural Affairs of the Communist Party of China announced on Jan. 29 the weekly price quotation of agricultural products, showing that the average price of 19 kinds of vegetables increased by 21.5% compared with the same period last year, including cauliflower at 7.41 yuan per kilogram, up 102% compared with 3.67 yuan a year ago, and scallions at 10.17 yuan per kilogram, up 238.4% compared with the same period last year. Among the prices of livestock and poultry products, pork, beef and mutton prices were all similar to those of last week. The price of eggs per kilogram was $10.25, similar to last week’s $10.33 and up 16.8% over the same period last year. The price of white chicken was 17.11 yuan per kilogram, down 8.9 percent from a year ago.

The official figures of the Chinese Communist Party hardly reflect the real situation of the Chinese people suffering from price increases.

As the Communist Party virus outbreak resumes in China, many areas are under lockdown and quarantine. A netizen in Shijiazhuang posted a video showing that since the blockade of the neighborhood, homeowners are being quarantined at Home and the prices of vegetables in the stores downstairs have risen sharply. One resident bought 2 pounds of leeks, 2 pounds of cucumbers, a package of shredded pancakes and a package of noodles, spending a total of 105 yuan.

Another netizen posted a photo of half a bowl of white porridge and an egg on the Internet, with the caption “Vegetable prices are soaring, so you can only dip them in soy sauce!”