Italian retail sales fell 0.7% in
May with respect to April and were 0.5% down on the same month
in 2013, national statistics agency Istat said Thursday.
The agency said the sale of food products suffered a
particularly sharp drop, falling 1.2% on April.
It added that the only food retailers to buck the negative
trend were discount supermarkets, whose sales were up 2.4% in
May on last year.
The figures are another sign that the Italian economy is
struggling to recover from its longest postwar recession.
In April retail sales had increased 0.3% on March and 2.7%
on the same month in 2013, but Istat that this was largely due
to the effects of Easter spending.
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