February 2022 year-to-date retail trade was up by 9.3% over the same period in 2021. 

• Sub-sectors that posted increases: Used car dealers (48.3%), Gasoline stations (29.8%), Electronics and appliance stores (4.2%), Health and personal care stores (4.2%),  Clothing and clothing accessories stores (5.9%), Sporting goods, hobby, book and music stores (14.1%), Grocery stores (12.7%), General merchandise stores (5.8%), and all other (60.7%). 
• Sub-sectors that posted decreases: New car dealers (-3.5%), Furniture and home furnishings stores (-10.1%), Building material and garden equipment and supplies dealers (-45.4%), and Beer, wine and liquor stores (-4.2%).

With supply shortages, February 2022 year-to-date new motor vehicle (units) sales were down -11.9% from February 2021. New minivans, sport-utility vehicles, light and heavy trucks, vans and buses sales were down -10.5% while new passenger cars sales were also down -25.4%.

February 2022 year-to-date restaurant receipts were up 15.0% over the same period in 2021.

• Within restaurant receipts, all categories posted increases: Special food services (36.5%), Drinking places (alcoholic beverages) (56.9%), Full-service restaurants (12.0%), and Limited-service eating places (13.1%).

February 2022 year-to-date manufacturing sales were up by 34.3% over the same period in 2021. 

• Sub-sectors that posted increases: Food manufacturing sales (60.6%), Machinery manufacturing sales (57.6%), and all other Manufacturing sales (23.2%). 
• Sub-sectors that posted decreases: Fabricated metal product manufacturing sales (-1.9%).

February 2022 year-to-date wholesale trade was up 38.8% over the same period in 2021.

• Sub-sectors that posted increases: Farm product merchant wholesalers (21.6%), Food, beverage and tobacco merchant wholesalers (6.2%), Agricultural supplies merchant wholesalers (112.4%), and Building material and supplies merchant wholesalers (8.5%).
• Sub-sectors that posted decreases: Machinery, equipment and supplies merchant wholesalers (-11.9%) and all other (-1.3%).

Total international merchandise exports were up 27.8% year-to-date March 2022 over March 2021.

• Sub-sectors that posted increases: Energy products (78.1%), Metal ores and non-metallic minerals (141.2%), Basic and industrial chemical, plastic and rubber products (38.6%), Forestry products and building and packaging materials (11.1%), Industrial machinery, equipment and parts (29.0%), Motor vehicles and parts (4.9%), and Special transactions (8.9%). 
• Sub-sectors that posted decreases: Farm, fishing and intermediate food products (-20.8%), Metal and non-metallic mineral products (-41.8%), Electronic and electrical equipment and parts (-11.0%), Aircraft and other transportation equipment and parts (-16.6%), and Consumer goods (-22.0%).

Driven by strong non-residential construction activity, year-to-date April 2022 construction employment was up by 3,525 positions or 8.9% from the same period in 2021.

April 2022 total year-to-date housing starts were down by -257 units or -19.5% over the same period in 2021 as a result of higher borrowing costs and a surge in apartment units in the first four months of 2021 not replicated in 2022. 

• Year-to-date increases: singles (4 units or 0.9%) and row (6 units or 4.1%). 
• Year-to-date declines: semi-detached (-33 units or -50.0%) and apartment and other types (-234 units or -34.1%).

March 2022 year-to-date building permits were up 36.2% over the same period in 2021. 

• All sub-sectors posted increases: residential (9.7%), industrial (216.4%), commercial (35.3%), and institutional and governmental (282.8%).

April 2022 year-to-date employment in Information, culture and recreation was up 4,800 positions or 35.9% over the same period in 2021.

The Q4 2021 Provincial population was up 0.23% or 2,703 persons over 2020 Q4 to 1,180,867. Contributing to population growth was a modest bounce-back in international immigration to 3,076 from 1,769 in the previous quarter and a higher than expected natural increase (births less deaths). Net inter-provincial migration has been negative every quarter since Q2 2013. 

After decreasing by -5.2% in 2020, Saskatchewan’s real GDP expanded by 3.8% in 2021. According to the Conference Board of Canada it in December 2021 forecast, the province's real GDP is forecasted to grow by 4.3% in 2022.

With the post pandemic recovery in full swing in most jurisdictions, and with the Ukraine conflict further adding upward pressure on prices, the Bank of Canada raised its benchmark rate twice in the last two months.  The benchmark rate was raised to 0.5 percent on March 2^nd then to 1.0 percent on April 13, 2022.  Inflation is now being viewed as widely entrenched.  This rate hike is up from the floor of 0.25 percent it held for much of the COVID-19 pandemic; these were the central bank’s first rate hikes since October 2018.