Canarian retail trade experienced an average year-on-year growth in sales of 7.2% and in employment of 4.2%, approaching pre-pandemic levels. These figures place it in the second national position only behind the Balearic Islands, according to data from the Sectoral Trade Bulletin of the Studies Service of the Chamber of Commerce of Tenerife regarding the fourth quarter of the year.
Regarding expectations for the coming year, Canarian merchants are very cautious about 2023, with a decrease in optimistic responses to 12%, with the majority predicting greater stability (65%) and with an increase in unfavorable responses (24%), as expressed in the business confidence survey.
For the president of the Internal Commerce Commission and vice president of the entity, Victoria González, the sales and employment data for the last quarter are very positive for the sector, which manages to maintain its growth and recovery trend during the past year.
In her opinion, price increases and interest rate hike measures have not yet been significantly noticed in consumption, which has benefited both from the recovery of employment experienced during the past year and from the significant demand generated by tourists, fueled by receiving a greater number of visitors and by the increase in spending they have made on the islands.
However, Victoria González has lamented the "missed opportunity" that means that the Canary Islands do not have an agile IGIC refund method that allows tourists to reinvest that money in Canarian businesses.
"The system that will come into effect at the end of February, in addition to other mistakes, returns that amount within a period that can be extended up to six months, which prevents the money from being spent in our territory," she indicated.
This is just one more case, González continues, of how the Government ignores the demands of the sector, as is the case with the tax franchise that puts Canarian businesses at a disadvantage compared to those in the Peninsula "and that despite having the support of all political groups is not eliminated".
This generates a situation of unfair competition that, she affirms, has been limiting and undermining the activity of a sector that represents a third of the GDP of the Canary Islands for years.
These good results of the commercial sector were also confirmed in the behavior of the Sector Confidence Indicator, which with an increase of 5.6%, is the second sector with the best result in the January survey.
29% of businesses stated that they had improved their activity during the last three months of 2022, compared to 17% who did not manage to improve it, and the remaining 55% indicated that they had maintained their activity compared to the summer months.
González also alluded to "two challenges" that the commercial sector will face in the coming years, one of them the challenge of modernization to remain competitive, adapting its offer to the accelerated changes that occur in all areas, as well as to consumer demand.
And the second, the uncertainty this year due to inflation containment measures, such as the rise in interest rates, the application of which will be noticed in the loss of purchasing power of families and their purchasing capacity.
Thus, between December 2019 and December 2022 alone, 823 commercial companies registered with Social Security have been lost.
For this reason, the Chamber of Commerce insists on the need to decisively support the sector to avoid the loss of a productive fabric that, despite the improvement, has not managed to recover its number of companies, on which many jobs depend.
A clear indicator, adds the Chamber, is the number of companies registered with Social Security in commercial activities with workers in their charge: in the Canary Islands there were a total of 14,037 last December, a figure that includes vehicle repair.
This figure represents a slight annual decrease of 0.2%, 32 fewer companies than in December 2021, motivated only by the fall in retail businesses (-83), since wholesalers and motor vehicle repair increased by 44 and 7 more companies, respectively.
For his part, the general director of the financial entity Cajasiete that sponsors the study, Manuel del Castillo, highlighted the message of optimism launched by these good results, with a very positive closing of commercial activity in 2022, especially if compared with the rest of the territory, "and this is largely due to the push that tourist activity is having and has had".
He added that "on the horizon we still find some clouds facing 2023, such as inflation, especially underlying inflation, or the progressive interest rate hikes that we are having, but if we are able to maintain these indicators we will ensure that economic activity continues to advance".
The Chamber of Commerce has also stressed that the Christmas campaign last month, "despite the doubts", has had positive results, even higher than those recorded a year earlier.
