Increasing Food Costs Blamed On Ethanol

Food costs kept rising in June, but motorists finally got some relief at the gas pump, helping to lower inflation to the smallest increase in five months. The Labor Department reported that consumer prices edged up by 0.2 percent in July. That was the best showing since January and far below the 0.7 percent surge of May, the biggest jump in nearly two years.But with the use of corn for ethanol pushing up food costs and gasoline prices rising again in July, economists said the moderation in inflation could prove temporary.