China - Chinese farmer Gao Ge was worried. The 27-year-old from Shandong province had chosen not to sell his freshly picked chilli pepper crop after prices soared by almost a third in just two weeks in November, hoping for even higher prices.

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Speculators were scooping up tonnes of the spicy fruit, betting on tight supplies as hot temperatures and heavy rain damaged the nation's crop, cutting it by 10 %. 

Last year, the same investors played a similar game in garlic, sending prices to stratospheric levels. But now, prices have slipped as fears about low supplies have ebbed, Gao hasn't sold a single pepper, and the two-tonne crop sitting at his small farm is losing its colour - and its value.

In late January, Gao was scrambling to sell his harvest in Jinxiang, one of the country's main chilli trading hubs, to fund his family of five's week-long Lunar New Year holiday. "I'm a bit panicked," he said by phone just days before festivities started on Jan. 28.