Retail sales grew by 26 percentnationwide during the period of May to November, in comparison with thesame period last year, the General Statistics Office (GSO) announced.
Adjusted for inflation, however, the volume and value of retail salesactually fell by between 14.7 and 16.7 percent. Inflation was heatingup, according to official figures, with the prices of goods and servicesrising by 1.86 percent last month alone.
The strongestgrowth in retail sales was in the private sector, which saw sales riseby 39.2 percent in the first 11 months of the year, while State-ownedenterprises and collectives have seen declining sales, noted GSO expertVu Manh Ha.
Ha attributed the advantage of the privatesector to fewer State price controls, with many enterprises takingadvantages of high inflation, high commercial lending rates, and theweakness of the Vietnamese dong against the US dollar to raise theprices on goods.
Over the next three months, the retailsales were likely to see a surge in both value and volume as consumerdemand for food, clothing, cosmetics, and transportation alltraditionally rise ahead of the lunar New Year holidays, the GSO said./.
