Malta's volume of retail trade drops by 0.5% since February 2019

Malta's volume of retail trade has dropped by 0.5% since February 2019 as the average retail trade volume increased by the same amount in both the euro area and EU28.

The highest decreases were observed in Slovenia (-3.1%), Croatia (-1.9%), and Austria (-0.8%) followed closely by Malta with -0.5%.

Compared with the same month of the previous year, however, Malta registered a 1.3% increase in retail trade volume.

The statistics were published by a Eurostat report on Monday.

On average in the euro area and EU28, in March 2019 compared with February of the same year, the volume of retail trade increased by 0.6% for food, drinks and tobacco while automotive fuel decreased by 0.6% and non-food products decreased by 0.4%.
Among Member States for which data are available, the largest increases in the total retail trade volume since February were registered in Lithuania (+1.7%), Portugal (+1.2%) and the United Kingdom (+1.1%).

The highest yearly increases in the total trade volume ere registered in Ireland (10.8%), Romania (9.3%) and Croatia and Luxembourg (8.6%).