World meat industry news

 Russian citizens spent 80.1 bln rubles ($1 bln) on impulse purchases from March 7 to March 13, which a 8.4% increase in comparison with the beginning of the month. Sberbank said in a press release.

"Expenses of Russian citizens between March 7 and 13 increased by 8.4% compared with the beginning of the month to 80.1 billion rubles that were spent on impulse purchases over these seven days," the bank said referring to the estimates of its analysts.

The most rapid growth in spending was recorded in the sector of household appliances and electronics. Between March 7 and 13, it increased by a quarter in comparison with the levels of January - February.

Sberbank attributes active purchases of household appliances to consumers reaction to the depreciation of the ruble, which was already observed earlier. Also,a noticeable increase in spending was registered in pharmacies. In the reporting period, it was 7.6% higher than at the beginning of the year.

"Russians finance their costs of household appliances and medical supplies partially by cutting travel expenses. Sales of tourism industry related goods and services have substantially dropped. The volume of spending on airline tickets fell by a third compared to the beginning of 2020, and spending on hotels reduced proportionally.

As for the purchases buckwheat and toilet paper, that has been widely discussed recently due to the spread of coronavirus, there is no significant change in consumer activity in grocery stores and supermarkets during the period under review. It is likely that the situation will change next week," the bank stressed.

On Thursday, VTB Bank reported that the volume of online purchases by Russian citizens had grown 1.5 times after many of them switched to working from home amid the spread of coronavirus. According to VTB, spending in pharmacies increased by a quarter and spending on air tickets increased by one third.