>Last week, the price of pork, a staple meat in China, dropped 0.7 per cent from a week earlier and 23.5 per cent year-on-year, the ministry said in a statement on its website.

The retail price of eggs decreased for a fourth week, down 0.3 per cent from the previous week.

The retreat came after the year-on-year growth of China's consumer price index, a main gauge of inflation, eased to 2.2 per cent in June, its lowest level since January 2010.

Falling farm produce prices may help further ease domestic inflationary pressure, as food prices account for a nearly one-third of the prices used to calculate the CPI.