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Level -> Inflation in China & South America (11/18/2007 9:28:27 AM)
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Beijing - Mrs. Wang stood by the shelves of cooking oil in one of Beijing's biggest supermarkets, inspecting the price stickers carefully.
A retired factory worker on a modest pension, Wang, who gave only one name, used to be able to buy her favorite brand of oil, a key ingredient in Chinese cuisine. "Today I buy whichever brand is cheap," she says. "We are feeling the pinch of rising food prices. We don't live as well as before."
Food prices, 17.6 percent higher than a year ago, have pushed China's consumer price index up faster than it has risen for a decade, official figures released this week showed.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/csm/20071116/wl_csm/ocookoil;_ylt=AlcQ63mm7Kdh62jQ8bmZcNis0NUE
LA MATANZA , Argentina — Miguel Mendez's wages as a restaurant cook haven't risen much over the past year, but the price of potatoes where he shops has doubled. Prices also have skyrocketed for tomatoes, apple cider, sweet bread and other foods.
"We're feeling it at home," said Mendez, who lives in this middle-class city outside the Argentine capital, Buenos Aires . "We spend more money now for less."
In South America , the age-old curse of inflation is making a comeback.
Prices in Argentina and Venezuela , which have seen robust economic growth over the past four years, have risen by nearly 20 percent this year, economists estimate. For Argentina , that's the highest rate since 2003, when the country was wrestling with an economic crisis. For Venezuela , the rate is the highest since 2004, when the country was emerging from a deep recession.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/mcclatchy/20071116/wl_mcclatchy/20071116bclataminflation_attn_national_foreign_editors_ytop;_ylt=AqwnCQ7iAL0T867OQACjKgas0NUE
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