Colombia’s retail sales and industrial output rose in February.
Retail sales increased 13.2% in February from a year earlier while industrial output climbed 2.4%, the government’s statistics agency, known as DANE, said Tuesday.
The retail sales figure is in stark contrast to 2010, when retail sales rose 12.8% and were seen as a driving force of Colombia’s economic expansion. Industrial output in 2010 rose 4.7%.
The Colombian central bank has pointed to strong consumer demand and private consumption as the backbone of the country’s economic growth last year.