South Africa’s auto sales edged up 5,6% during September at 57 617 units — an improvement of 3 057 units — compared to 54 560 new vehicles sold during the corresponding month last year, data released on Tuesday by the National Association of Automobile Manufacturers of South Africa (Naamsa) showed.
However, Naamsa commented that aggregate sales had reflected a decline of 2 188 vehicles or 3,6% compared to the record August 2006 sales figures. Contributing to the drawback was the sales of new car and light commercial vehicle, while sales of medium and heavy commercial vehicles held up extremely well.
“Whilst the September 2006 new car sales represented a new record level for the month of September, the year-on-year growth had slowed considerably,” Naamsa said in statement.
New car sales were at 37 791 units reflected a gain of 1 334 cars or 3,7% compared to the 36 457 new cars sold during September 2005. The new car market had, however, shown a decline of 1 412 units or 3,6% compared to the record monthly sales of August 2006 during which 39 203 units had been traded. On a year-to-date-basis, the new car market, in terms of new car sales reported through Naamsa, had remained 15,9% ahead of the corresponding nine months last year.
The year on year rate of growth in respect of new light commercial vehicles sales, bakkies and minibuses had also declined and at 16 607 units reflected an improvement of 1 023 vehicles or 6,6% compared to the 15 584 unit sales during the corresponding month last year. Sales of light commercial vehicles had also shown a decline compared to August 2006 with sales falling by 827 units or 4,7%.
On a year-to-date-basis, light commercial vehicle sales remained 14,7% ahead of the corresponding nine months of 2005, Naamsa added.
However, sales of vehicles in the medium and heavy truck segments of the industry had performed relatively better and the September 2006 sales of medium commercial vehicles at 1 505 units and sales of heavy trucks and buses at 1 714 units reflected an improvement of 446 units or 42,1%, in the case of medium commercial vehicles, and 254 units or 17,4%, in the case of heavy trucks and buses — compared to the corresponding month last year.
On a year-to-date-basis, medium commercial vehicles remain 19,6% ahead of the corresponding nine months of 2005, while the heavy commercial segment reflected an improvement of 23,8% compared to the corresponding month last year.
“It was clear that the medium and heavy commercial vehicle segments continued to benefit from strong fixed investment and infrastructural development,” the industry body said.
On the exports front, aggregate vehicle exports for the first nine months of 2006 at 129 603 vehicles reflected an improvement of 33 490 units or 34,8% compared to the 96 113 export sales during the corresponding period of 2005.
Naamsa stated that the momentum of export sales had also declined considerably over the past two months but was expected to pick up again as additional vehicle export programmes were implemented.
During the months ahead and into 2007, it was generally expected that the growth in the new vehicle market segments would continue to show consolidation on the back of recent and expected further increases in interest rates, sharply higher producer price inflation and increased pressure on new vehicle pricing on the back of exchange rate weakness.
Particularly, the anticipated tighter monetary environment and rising new car prices would contribute to the further expected slowdown in growth in the market.
Overall, however, given the strong sales performance, 2006 would represent a record year for the industry for the third year in succession. – I-Net Bridge