Fresh fruit is 11 per cent more expensive than a year ago, while vegetables are up 11.7 per cent and meat is up 1.2 per cent.
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Prices were up in seven of the eight major components – including food and shelter – compared with a year ago.
Canada’s central bank will probably keep its policy lending rate at 0.5 percent into next year, according to a Bloomberg economist survey, with consumer price increases lagging behind policy makers’ 2 percent target until then. Pacific time, is trading at a six-week low today following reports that the United States Federal Reserve might increase interest rates in September, a stronger US dollar and falling commodity prices, including oil. Excluding energy, inflation rose to 2.1 per cent.
Gasoline in April dropped in price 5.8% compared with a year ago, while natural gas fell 12.8% and fuel oil plunged 19.3%.
Josh Nye, an economist with RBC Economics, said the 0.3 per cent rise in consumer prices, which pushed the annual rate of inflation to 1.7 per cent from the 1.3 per cent in March, matched market expectations. The moves compared with drops of 13.6 per cent, 17.4 per cent and 25.8 per cent respectively for March.
The loonie, as the Canadian dollar is known, dropped 0.2 per cent to 76.25 USA cents as of 8:34 a.m.in Toronto.
The wholesale sales figures followed a report Tuesday that manufacturing sales fell 0.9 per cent to $50.0 billion in March, the second consecutive monthly decline.
On the upside, sales at clothing and accessories stores rose 0.8 per cent, Statistics Canada said. Overall food prices were down 0.5 per cent.
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Lower sales were recorded in six provinces, with Ontario contributing the most to that decline in dollar terms.
