Retail sales of consumer goods boost Inner Mongolia

(chinadaily.com.cn)

Updated: 2016-08-25

In the first seven months of 2016, total retail sales of consumer goods reached 356.76 billion yuan ($53.79 billion) in the Inner Mongolia autonomous region, a year-on-year increase of 9.5 percent. This was higher than the target that had been set, according to the local commerce department.

Consumption, from January to July in various retail sectors, can be broken down into separate parts for analysis.

The sales of retail goods in urban areas reached 322.54 billion yuan, a rise of 9.3 percent compared with the same period last year, whilst retail goods consumption in rural areas increased by 11.4 percent from the same period last year.

The growth in the purchasing of commodities appears to be booming, with regional sales of 302.03 billion yuan, an increase of 9.3 percent on the same period last year.

Expenditure on groceries has also undergone a substantial increase, with sales of grains, oil, foodstuffs, tobacco and alcohol hitting 16.31 billion yuan, representing growth of 19.2 percent.

As for jewelry and automobile purchases, the former hit 1.99 billion yuan, an 11.9 percent rise over the same period last year, and the latter was 27.44 billion yuan, an 11.4 percent year-on-year increase.

However, spending on petroleum and related products was down during the first seven months of this year, with 28.65 billion yuan of sales, a 7.3 percent decline.