The growth in the number of registered vehicles in Korea slowed significantly in the first nine months of the year from a year earlier, the government said, apparently reflecting the economic slowdown in Asia's fourth-largest economy.
As of the end of September, the total number of registered vehicles here came to about 18.76 million, up 1.7 percent from the 18.44 million tallied at the end of 2011, according to the Ministry of Land, Transport and Maritime Affairs.
The growth of some 390,000 registered cars in the nine-month period ended Sept. 30 represents a drop from the 490,000 cars added to the total in the same period last year.
"The monthly average increase of registered vehicles has declined steadily from 51,000 units in 2010 to 41,000 in 2011 and again to 36,000 so far this year," the ministry said.
The drop, although the figure for newly registered vehicles includes renewed or fresh registrations of vehicles following a transfer, represents shrinking new vehicle sales in the country.
In September alone, the combined domestic sales of the country's five automakers slipped 6.65 percent on-year to 115,811 cars.
Imported vehicles, on the other hand, continued to increase their share in the local market, according to the ministry. The number of registered imported vehicles came to 712,736, growing 14.8 percent from all of 2011 in just the first nine months of the year.
The number of passenger vehicles came to about 14.47 million cars as of the end of September, representing more than 77 percent of the total.(Yonhap)