Car sales down 60 percent
The sale of new passenger cars in Russia will go down 60 percent in 2009 says Deputy Minister for Industry and Commerce Andrey Dementyev. This is 20 percent more than predicted in December.
In December, the ministry said that sales were expected to go down 40 percent in 2009, but results from the first quarter of 2009 show that even that prognosis was too optimistic, news paper Vedomosti reports.
According to numbers from the European Business Association 2.92 million passenger cars and light commercial vehicles were sold in Russia in 2008. If the prognosis from the Ministry of Industry and Commerce turns out to be right, less than 1.50 million new cars will be sold in Russia in 2009.
