MALAYSIA’S wholesale and retail trade declined by 14.7% to RM92.7 billion in July 2021, the Department of Statistics said today.

The negative growth, for the second consecutive month this year, is due to the Covid-19 lockdowns implemented by the government, the department said.

Motor vehicles was the worst performing subsector, registering  -85.6% growth, followed by retail trade at -8.1% and wholesale trade at -1.1%.

The department said the motor vehicle sub-sector’s poor performance was due to a drop in sales of motor Vehicles  (-83.8%), sale of motor vehicles parts and  accessories (-87.4%), maintenance & repair of motor vehicles (-88.7%), and sale, maintenance & repair of motorcycles (-86.9%).

However, the month-on-month sales of motor vehicles rose to 118.6% due to car showrooms and sales centres reopening in areas under phase 2 of the national recovery plan.

The slump in the retail trade was mostly attributed to a decline in retail sale in non-specialised stores (-10.8%), retail sale in specialised stores (-11.1%) and retail sale of automotive fuels (-14.1%).

Meanwhile, wholesale trade recorded RM49.5 billion in sales for July 2021. But when compared to the same period last year, growth was also negative at -1.1%.

The -1.1% decline was due to a -12.1% drop in wholesale of household goods and a -12.1% growth in wholesale of machinery and equipment. – September 10, 2021.