Higher rice prices driving up Japan's CPI

High rice prices continued to drive up consumer inflation in Japan in May. The country's staple crop more than doubled in price for the first time compared to the same month a year earlier. The internal affairs ministry says the 101.7 percent jump in the price of rice was the highest since the government started keeping comparable data in 1971.

It was 3.3 points higher than in April, extending a record for the eighth straight month. Overall, Japan's Consumer Price Index, excluding prices for fresh food, rose 3.7 percent in May from a year earlier. That's 0.2 percentage points higher than in April, and it was the sixth straight month of a reading of 3 percent or above.