China said Wednesday its consumer price index rose 5.3 per cent year on year in April -- a slight easing from March but well above Beijing's official four-percent target for 2011.

The politically-sensitive inflation reading had widely been expected to slow from a 32-month high of 5.4 per cent in March, mainly on the back of falling vegetable prices caused by increased supply.

But economists say they nevertheless expect prices to remain high and peak around mid-year, even as anxious leaders in Beijing try to rein in rising costs
of food, housing and other household essentials.

The CPI was slightly higher than the median forecast of 5.2 per cent in a Dow Jones Newswires poll of 14 economists.

"The general rising trend of CPI has been initially contained and government measures to control prices had initial positive effects," Sheng Laiyun, spokesman for the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), told reporters.

But he warned: "Even though the trend has been initially contained, CPI is still under rather big pressure due to the situation in the country and abroad."

Inflation had hit 5.0 per cent for the first quarter.

"Inflation has taken a measured step back, retreating from March's 32-month peak, sending out a strong signal that inflation is, or near, peaking," Beijing-based IHS Global Insight economist Alistair Thornton said.

"The broad message is this slight pullback far from signals the end of China's inflationary concerns. It's clear this is still a key policy priority," Thornton told AFP.

The International Monetary Fund has forecast China's inflation should fall to just above four percent by the end of the year on the back of Beijing's tough tightening policies.

Interest rates have been hiked four times since October and the central bank has increased on numerous occasions lenders' reserve requirement ratio, which effectively limits the amount of money they can loan out.

"The most pressing problem we are facing right now is the problem of inflation," Chinese Vice Premier Wang Qishan said in a US television interview broadcast earlier this week during high-level Sino-US talks in Washington.

Wang pledged that Beijing would use monetary policy, fiscal policy and economic restructuring to fight soaring prices.

In April, Premier Wen Jiabao made a rare pledge to increase the flexibility of the yuan's exchange rate to ease price pressures, suggesting top leaders were willing to accept a stronger currency to bring down domestic prices.

The potential for spiralling inflation to spark unrest was highlighted last month when hundreds of truckers went on strike at port facilities in Shanghai over rising fuel costs, prompting a heavy police response to restore calm.

Output from the country's millions of factories and workshops expanded by 13.4 percent on-year in April, the NBS said.

Fixed asset investment, a measure of government spending on infrastructure, rose 25.4 per cent in the first four months of 2011, compared with the same period a year earlier.

Retail sales, the main gauge of consumer spending in the world's second-largest economy, rose 17.1 per cent in April from a year ago.

channelnewsasia.com