A new sociological study on automobiles in China was released by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences this weekend, the Beijing News reported today. The study claims that there will be no sudden rapid growth rates in the country's automobile market as seen a few years ago. However, as annual production and sales numbers are nearing the 20 million unit mark, the total number of automobiles in the country is expected to continue to increase significantly over the next few years.
According to CASS Assistant Researcher Wang Junxiu, there were over 20 vehicles for every hundred households in the country last year. He predicts that number to increase to almost 60 in a decade or so.
Mr. Wang points out that policies in cities such as Beijing and Guangzhou aimed at limiting the number of new vehicle registrations in Chinese cities are at odds with the automobile industry. He predicts such policies to spread to more first-tier, second-tier and even third-tier cities, leading to a larger contradiction between automobile sales growth and the desire to limit the number of vehicles in Chinese cities.
