According to the latest data out of the Australian Bureau of Statistics, Australian retail turnover fell 0.1 per cent in March 2017.

Though a continuation of the negative trend set by the previous month, it’s still a 2.5% increase on March 2016.

Breaking down the data, the ABS say that there were falls in food retailing (-0.5%), cafes, restaurants and takeaway food services (-0.5%), department stores (-0.6%) and household goods )retailing (-0.1%).

According to the bureau, these falls were offset by rises in other retailing (1.1%) and clothing, footwear and personal accessory retailing (0.4%).

They also note that online retail turnover contributed 3.7% to total retail turnover in original terms.