CRI听力: Glutinous Rice Balls More Expensive This Lantern Festival

Those wishing to celebrate the upcoming Lantern Festival with a traditional meal of Yuanxiao may find the little sweet sticky dumplings more expensive than in previous years.

The Lantern Festival is this Sunday, which is January 15th on the lunar calendar, and marks the end of the Chinese New Year season.

Our reporter Liu Min has more.

Workers at the Daoxiangcun food company in Beijing have been diligently preparing Yuanxiao in preparation for the upcoming peak season. The small glutinous rice dumplings represent family unity, and are traditionally eaten during the Lantern Festival celebrations.

It's a complicated production process. A rolled up ball of filling is dipped in water then coated with sticky rice flour. This is then repeated at least five times, says Chi Xiangdong, a manager at the company.

"The portions are strictly standardized. Each dumpling weighs 26.67 grams and each stuffing ball weighs 7.14grams."

In the past, a 400 gram package of Yuanxiao was priced at only 18 Yuan, this year it would cost up to 24 Yuan, Chi Xiangdong says,

"This is mainly because the cost of the raw materials has increased. For example, glutinous rice used to be 4 Yuan per kilogram, but this year it's at 6 Yuan, a 50 percent increase. The price of sugar has also increased by 50 percent."

Sticky rice and sugar are the main ingredients in the dessert. Each rice dumpling is made of 20 percent sugar. Other ingredients such as walnuts, haw and sesame have also increased in price.
Many well-known dessert and snack brands in Beijing have raised their Yuanxiao prices by 10 percent, and say that's still barely enough to maintain a profit.

Liu Chunping is a manager from Jinfang Snack Company.

"The 10 percent increase can't balance out the price increase of the raw materials. The price of labour is also increasing, and we're now paying the part time workers much more than in previous years.

Jin Fang needs the labour to produce 5,000 kilograms of Yuanxiao everyday, which is difficult to find at this time of the year when most migrant workers travel home to see family.

Customers seem fairly philosophical about the higher price.

"Labour is now more expensive, operation costs and resource costs have also jumped. I can completely understand.(www.hXen.com)

"It's just for the sake of the festival. However high the prices get, we will continue to celebrate with our customary foods."

Besides the food production chains, many restaurants have also been preparing Yuanxiao for the festival. But due to the increase in prices, many supermarkets in cities such as Xi'an won't be making or selling them this year, which means customers will have to look for them in specialty snack food shops.

For China Drive, I'm Liu Min.