Panic buying pushes retail sales up by 30.3%

The panic buying experienced by the two major cities; Accra and Kumasi prior to the implementation of the partial lockdown due to the Covid-19 pandemic have had a positive effect on overall retail sales as recorded by the Bank of Ghana (BoG).

Retail sales increased by 53.7 percent (year-on-year) to GH¢93.55 million in March 2020, up from the GH¢60.88 million recorded in the same period in 2019.  Compared to February 2020, retail sales grew by 30.3 percent. Cumulatively, for the first quarter of 2020, retail sales went up by 39.9percent to GH¢236.85 million from GH¢169.34 million for the same period in 2019.

“The relative improvement in retail sales was largely due to the widespread panic buying just before implementation of the Covid-19 partial lockdown on March 30, 2020,” BoG report.

According to the Bank of Ghana’s Monetary Policy report on the real sector development, consumer spending, proxied by domestic VAT collections and retail sales, recorded mixed performance in March 2020, compared to the corresponding period in 2019.

Domestic VAT collections declined by 19.7 percent on a year-on-year basis to GH¢319.81 million, from GH¢398.10 million. On a month-on-month basis, Domestic VAT dipped by 27.1 percent in March 2020 from GH¢438.60 million in the preceding month.

The report indicated that the observed decline in domestic VAT collections was partly due to decreased consumer demand during the review period. However, cumulatively, total domestic VAT for the first quarter of 2020 marginally went up by 4.5 percent to GH¢1,182.25 million compared with GH¢1,131.40 million for the corresponding period of last year.

Source: Kofi Ahovi//Businessweekghana.com