The Croatian Chamber of Commerce (HGK) has started to get itchy feet in the face of the stringent anti-epidemic measures put into place by the Croatian Government and the National Civil Protection Headquarters. The opening hours for shops are giving them the biggest headache.
As Poslovni Dnevnik writes on the 22nd of April, 2020, Croatian wholesale trade has dropped significantly, more precisely from 8.1 percent (from 9.6 billion kuna down to 8.9 billion kuna) in the previous month compared to March last year, while the situation in the retail trade was slightly better as the amount of fiscal receipts issued decreased by just 2.9 per cent, from 7.3 billion kuna down to 7.1 billion kuna.
The Croatian Chamber of Commerce has asked the National Civil Protection Headquarters to lift the current coronavirus restrictions on the operation of all Croatian shops.
“The current favourable epidemiological picture makes it possible for us to be able to open all stores, of course, with the strict implementation of the necessary epidemiological measures. These days, more and more people are returning to work, and most aren’t managing to arrive at stores until 17:00, which puts unnecessary pressure on both the stores and on the health of the crowds of people waiting. Re-introducing normal working hours would optimise this and benefit the whole economy,” said the Croatian Chamber of Commerce’s Vice President for Trade and Finance, Josip Zaher, adding that security measures should be determined by the number of visitors relative to the square footage of the shop’s premises.
“This will enable the opening of almost all stores without any discrimination, and special attention should be paid to the opening of large shopping centres due to the large fluctuation of customers,” Zaher explained, noting that trade is an extremely important activity for the Croatian economy and that we should enable the normalisation of the conditions for it as soon as possible, in order to try to stem the decline in Croatia’s economic activity.
Make sure to follow our dedicated section for all you need to know about coronavirus in Croatia. Follow our business page for more on the Croatian economy.
