Fact of the Day: Best Investment of the Year

What is the best-performing asset this year?

Gold? Steel? Copper? Oil?

It's something of a more pungent edible bulbous nature -- garlic.

In some parts of China, garlic prices almost quadrupled to as high as 9 yuan ($1.32) per kilogram since March.

Some think it's because farmers lost money last year with too much garlic on the market, so they decided to scale back by planting less.

Others think that because of the A(H1N1) influenza virus spreading, many believe that eating garlic helps keep people healthy, so an extraordinary amount of garlic is being consumed.

The BBC quoted garlic seller and eater Jiang Haiqu as saying, "Every dish needs garlic and it's a good disinfectant. People who eat it live longer than others."

Guo Dongliang, a garlic seller also said that with the rise of oil prices, transportation costs also contributed to higher prices of garlic.

Some even think there are people hording the white bulbs to intentionally raise prices.

But whatever the theory may be, China produces three-quarters of the world's garlic. So you may eventually have to pay small fortune for a pungent (and healthy) flavour.