Inflation top priority for PBOC

Keeping inflation down is the top monetary policy priority, Chinese central bank governor said Friday after the release of the consumer price index (CPI) for March.

China will adjust the weighting of the four monetary policy targets according to market situations. Maintaining low inflation is the number one objective, Zhou Xiaochuan, head of the People's Bank of China (PBOC) told the Boao Forum for Asia (BFA) 2014 Annual Conference.

Monetary policy balances inflation, growth, employment and the balance of payments. The consumer price index (CPI) increased 2.4 percent year on year in March, up from 2 percent in the previous month, official data showed on Friday.

Inflation was mainly attributed to higher food prices, which account for nearly one-third of the weighting in the calculation of China's CPI.

Food prices gained 4.1 percent and contributed 1.35 percentage points of March's CPI growth, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

CPI rose 2.3 percent in the first quarter from a year earlier, said the NBS.