Fuel sales grew 23.5% in March compared with February, non-food sales grew 12.6%, and food sales grew 9.1%.
Compared with March 2020, retail sales grew 9.1% in unadjusted data and by 5.6% in seasonally adjusted data. Annual growth in March was driven by 21.1% growth in non-food sales and 9.9% growth in fuel sales, while sales of food, beverages and tobacco declined 2.1%.
In the first quarter, retail sales in Romania grew 4.1% compared with the same period in 2020. Adjusted for seasonality, retail sales grew just 0.8% in the first quarter.