Sales Of Locally Made Cars In Romania Extremely Low – Carmakers

Constantin Stroe, head of the Romanian auto manufacturers” association ACAROM, said Thursday sales of locally produced cars on the domestic market is extremely low, making Romania a unique case among countries with an auto-making industry.

„Out of 337,000 cars made in Romania, only 8.7% were sold on the local market, compared with 28% in France or 27% in Germany. This is disastrous. There is no other country in the world that makes cars and sells so little on the local market,” said Stroe.

He added the situation could worsen as the government-backed program encouraging the scrapping of old cars favors the acquisition of newer, but still used, imported cars.

Romania”s local carmakers are Dacia and Ford. The local industry increased 0.8% last year, to 337,765 cars, with a 5.3% increase on the passenger car segment and a 55% decline in the production of commercial vehicles.

Sales of new passenger cars and commercial vehicles in Romania dropped 20.9% in 2012, to 87,505 units, one of the biggest declines in the European Union.