COAL prices in China, the world's largest producer and consumer of the fuel, fell last month after miners increased output and cut exports to ease a shortfall caused by the heaviest snowstorms in five decades.

Prices of power-station coal at Qinghuangdao, China's biggest port for the fuel, declined to 600 yuan (US$86) a metric ton at the end of February, from as high as 625 yuan earlier in the month, the National Development and Reform Commission said yesterday. China, which relies on coal to generate 78 percent of its electricity, shut seven percent of its coal-fired power plants in January after the biggest snowstorms since 1954 disrupted deliveries.