Annual food inflation in New Zealand has picked up to 1.3% in November from 1.2% in October, data by Statistics New Zealand showed.

It has pointed to the fastest increase in food prices since February.

The acceleration was mostly driven by higher cost of non-alcoholic beverages (up 4.4% YoY), restaurant meals and ready-to-eat food (up 3.3% YoY) and grocery food (up 2.5% YoY).

In monthly terms, New Zealand food prices edged down 0.1% in November, after a 0.9% decrease in October. The drop was primarily driven by lower prices of vegetables (-7.9% month-on-month).

The New Zealand Dollar was 0.52% firmer on the day against its US counterpart, with the NZD/USD currency pair last trading at 0.5782.

Kiwi traders are now expecting the release of the semi-annual fiscal update on Tuesday, followed by the GDP growth data for Q3 on Thursday.