4 out of 10 firms in S. Korea experience raw materials price hikes higher than 20 pct: survey

About 4 out of 10 companies in South Korea saw their raw material prices jump 20 percent or more this year amid fast-rising oil and commodity bills, a central bank survey showed Monday.

According to the survey by the Bank of Korea on 570 firms, 40.3 percent said so, with 8.1 percent saying that the prices jumped 50 percent or higher compared with a year earlier.

With the raw material price increase, 69 percent of those surveyed raised the prices of their products or services. Of them, 43.1 percent said their price hikes remained below 20 percent from a year earlier.

Of the firms that have yet to raise prices, 53 percent said that they plan to hike product prices within this year to reflect mounting bills from materials, the survey showed.

The survey came as South Korea is grappling with inflation running high amid global oil and commodity price hikes driven by rebounding demand, pandemic-caused lockdowns in China and supply-chain disruptions caused by the war in Ukraine.

Concerns are growing that inflation pressure could mount further as companies are rushing to transfer the fast-rising bills from raw materials into the prices of their products and services.

In May, the country's consumer prices jumped 5.4 percent on-year, the fastest rise in almost 14 years. (Yonhap)