Hong Kong - Hong Kong's inflation rate almost doubled to 6.3 per cent in February as snow storms in China pushed the price of food up steeply, government officials announced Thursday. The consumer price index rose from 3.2 per cent in January to 6.3 per cent in February as the cost of groceries shot up, the Hong Kong government's Census and Statistics Department announced.
A spokesman attributed the sharp rise in the inflation rate partly to "increases in prices of basic foodstuffs as affected by the snowstorms in the mainland (China)."
Most of the meat, fruit and vegetables consumed in Hong Kong, a densely populated city of 6.9 million, comes from neighboring mainland China.
Food prices in China soared in February as unusually severe snow storms swept the country, blanketing some sub-tropical parts of southern China that never usually see snow.
