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In China, all major aspects of people’s daily needs are epitomized by a Chinese proverb, “Yi Shi Zhu Xing,” which literally¹ translates to clothing, food, residence and transportation. Now to get a better grasp of how prices have changed on these fronts over the past year, we are joined in the studio by my colleague Wu Haojun.

Answer: Certainly, Yi Shi Zhu Xing covers pretty much all the basic necessities of daily life. Let’s first take a look at food, which has the heaviest weight in China’s CPI calculation. In the past year, it’s been leading China’s CPI growth. The average annual growth comes down to about 4.6% in 2013. And that’s despite rising production in staple² foods like grain. Now moving on to housing related prices, which account for about 20% of China’s CPI basket. The total yearly average comes down to 2.8%. But that doesn’t reflect the overall picture for two reasons. First the 2.8% also includes water, electricity and other related prices, it tells a different story when you look at rent alone, which rose by more than 4% in most months of last year, riding on the unstoppable rise in home prices. And that brings us to the second point, the price of buying a home is not included in the CPI basket. And on clothing and transportation. An average rise of 2.28% in clothing mostly due to rising labor³ cost here in China. And finally something positive for the consumers with a negative reading in transportation and communication related CPI.

Question: China’s producer prices, a measure of the cost of goods as they leave the factory, also came out on Thursday. What does the figure tell us about the economy?

Answer: Well, the producer-price index fell 1.4 percent from a year before, that’s the 22nd straight drop. Some analysts⁴ say this kind of producer-price deflation means manufacturing is still facing lots of challenges. And speaking of challenges, something to watch for on Friday here as well, China’s General Administration of Customs is scheduled to announce 2013 trade figures on Friday. Early predictions made by a spokesman at the commerce ministry⁵, said that China’s total trade in goods last year was expected to reach $4.14 trillion. That would mark about a seven percent increase from 2012, less than the government’s target of eight percent.