A major benchmark of China’s factory-gate prices continued to rise in April, as the energy shock linked to the US-Israel war on Iran weighs on producers in the world’s second-largest economy.

After returning to growth for the first time in more than three years in March, the producer price index (PPI) recorded a higher-than-expected year-on-year increase of 2.8 per cent in April, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

This followed March’s 0.5 per cent year-on-year increase, which had reflected imported inflationary pressures in energy-intensive sectors such as chemicals and fuels.

Economists polled by the financial data provider Wind had forecast a 1.53 per cent uptick.

The April reading points to a further pass-through of elevated global energy costs into domestic prices, underscoring the risks that external volatility places on Beijing’s energy security.

The consumer price index (CPI) – a crucial gauge of inflation – rose 1.2 per cent year-on-year last month, compared with market expectations of 0.95 per cent as represented by the Wind poll and an increase of 1 per cent in March.

Dong Lijuan, a senior statistician at the bureau, said, driven by volatility in global crude, domestic energy prices climbed 5.7 per cent, which contributed an increase of 0.39 percentage points to the month-on-month CPI rise.