CHINA'S consumer prices surged more than expected by the fastest pace in 25 months in October, highlighting urgency for the government to rein in inflation.

The Consumer Price Index, the main gauge of inflation, climbed 4.4 percent from a year earlier last month, the National Bureau of Statistics said today.

It was more than market forecasts of up to 4.2 percent.

The rise picked up from increases of 3.6 percent in September and 3.5 percent in August. The growth rate in the first ten months thus reached 3 percent, making it hard to reach a government-set target of keeping inflation under 3 percent for the whole year.

Fears of worsening inflation and asset bubbles have made regulators to shift to a tight monetary policy. The central bank announced last night to raise banks' reserve requirement ratio by 50 basis points to a record 18 percent starting next Tuesday. This is expected to freeze 300 billion yuan (US$45.2 billion) worth of liquidity.