Lunar Year Price Hikes in China

It’s December 29 according to the lunar calendar, tomorrow is new year’s eve. In China this time of the year is a one of the major holidays, which lasts for about a week where most people brave the peak rush periods. This is not like the peak rush periods for any typical country – we are talking China here not 100s or 1000s of people but more like hundreds of thousands of people all trying to get home for the holidays to spend time with family. Highways and roads jammed with traffic to trains, buses, airlines and boats all heavily booked and sometimes over crowded making it almost impossible to make any last minute travel plans.

Trains, inter-city highway buses and ferries all charge a lunar new year surplus fee; however, today I noticed the price of vegetables went from 2 yuan (0.30 USD) to 7 yuan (1.06USD)! Even that 2 yuan was 1yuan three years ago and just a few short years earlier it was normal to get vegetables for just a few cents.

… and where in China is this?
This is in Guangxi-Zhuang Autonomous Region in southwestern China. However, this is not Nanning the capital city of the autonomous region but this is Ningming – only a few short hours north of the Vietnam-China border. This is where most of all the vegetables are grown! So I wonder what are the prices like in cities like Nanning, Guangzhou or Shanghai at this time of the year?

If anyone has any idea how much vegetables cost before and during the lunar new year please let me know in the comments below this post.