U.S. import prices soared last month on higher energy, food and commodity prices, pushing the annual increase to a record high, the Labor Department reported Friday, the Wall Street Journal reports.

In a worrisome trend for Federal Reserve officials as they balance recession worries with stubbornly high inflation, price pressures appeared to spill over into consumer goods, while import prices from China posted their biggest monthly and annual increases on record.

Separately, U.S. industrial production increased during January but only slightly as colder weather elevated utilities output and offset sharp declines in the auto and housing sectors, the Federal Reserve said.

Import prices jumped 1.7% on a monthly basis in January, compared to December’s 0.2% decline. Wall Street economists expected only a 0.5% increase last month. Compared to a year ago, import prices soared 13.7%, the highest reading since the government began compiling the data in 1982.

Petroleum import prices rose 5.5% last month compared to December, and were up 66.9% on the year, the steepest annual rise since October 2004. Natural-gas prices rose 1.6% on the month.

Excluding petroleum, import prices rose 0.6% in January and were up 3.6% on the year, the highest since October 2005.

The government releases more closely watched U.S. producer and consumer price data next. So far, those broad gauges of inflation have suggested that the economy is largely withstanding the steady rise in import prices. Should that change, Fed officials would face an unwelcome mix of higher inflation and weak growth.

Read the full Wall Street Journal story

.(subscription required)