Today, Eurostat published its press release on Retail Trade for August 2014 in the European Union.

Malta has fared in line with the average performance of the members of the Eurozone area and marginally under the EU28 group. On a month on month basis, volume of retail trade for August 2014 increased by 1.2%. This figure is up from the negative 1.1% registered in July 2014.

Malta's growth rate in volume of retail trade in August 2014 was in line with the euro area, which also stood at 1.2%, but marginally lower than the EU28 which stood at 1.4%.

However, on a yearly comparison, Malta's growth in the volume of retail trade stood at 0.8% (August 2014), compared to 1.9% for the euro area and 2.5% for the entire bloc.

Although yearly growth for Malta was lower than that recorded for the EU18 and EU28, yet it shows an improvement from the yearly decline of 2.7% that was recorded for July 2014.

Malta SME performance of SMEs in 2013

The European Commission has classified Malta among the "front runners group" of EU nations which have registered concrete positive signs of recovery in terms of employment, value added and growth in the SME sector over the period 2008-2013.

In a report published today by the EU Commissioner, Ferdinando Nelli Ferroci, Malta's economy is said to have weathered the crisis of recent years fairly well and so did the SME sector.

SMEs in Malta represent 99.8% of all businesses and account for 73.2% of the economic value added and 78% of employment in the private non-financial sector. SMEs in the business economy have grown consistently.

The findings for the period 2008 to 2013 are as follows:

Ø  SMEs increased by 4,800 (+20%) to a total 28,905 firms,

Ø  Value Added grew at a rate of 16.7% and

Ø  Employment in SMEs expanded with almost net 7,000 jobs, reaching a total of 98,000 (+7.7%).

Forecast 2015:

Ø  An increase of 1,500 new SMEs,

Ø  Net employment increase of almost 4,000,

Ø  Value Added is also set to expand.

The Ministry for the Economy, Investment and Small business welcomed these positive results and stated that the Government is committed to address the recommendations made by the Commission intended to further strengthen the SME sector, which represents the country's economic backbone. This will come about by the full implementation of all provisions of the Malta Small Business Act of 2011.