China's consumer price index (CPI) rose 5.3 percent year-on-year in July, mainly due to the lagging effect of price hikes at the end of 2003 and one-time factors, said the monthly report released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) Thursday.

The July inflation rate was 0.3 percentage points higher than the 5 percent rise in June, making it the second consecutive month that China's inflation exceeded 5 percent.

NBS figures show that the average CPI for January to July rose 3.8 percent over the same period last year, climbing even higher on the back of a 3.6 percent growth for the first half of this year.

People's Bank of China, the central bank, has predicted that the inflation rate will continue to rise in the third quarter before falling in the fourth quarter.

Grain prices, which have grown fast since the end of last year,contributed significantly to the mounting inflationary pressure. In July, grain prices surged 31.8 percent over the same month of last year, while prices of food oil jumped 23.3 percent.

If such contingent factors as grain price fluctuation are deducted, the monthly CPI in China has actually shown a declining trend since the second quarter. The CPI dipped 0.1 percent in May as compared with April and dropped 0.7 percent and 0.2 percent subsequently in following two months.

Source: Xinhua