Thailand’s new vehicle market continued to decrease in September, with sales falling by 27.5 percent to 68,843 units compared with 94,859 units in the same month of last year, according to a report released by the Federation of Thai Industries.

In the first nine months of this year, vehicle sales were down by over 37 percent at 648,116 units, compared with 1,034,199 units previously. Vehicle production in this period was down by over 27 percent to 1,408,000 units while exports were just 1 percent lower at 838,952 units.

Spokesman for the FTI's automotive industry club Surapong Paisitpatanapong said Thailand has produced a total of 164,299 vehicles in September, in which 97,570 units was exported, down 17.49 percent, with the value 43.8 billion THB, down 16.32 percent.

Car exports in the nine months totalled 838,952 units, down 1 percent, with export value of 395 billion THB, a drop of 12.63 percent year on year. Export of automobiles and parts, as well as motorcycles and parts, was worth 69.855 billion THB in September, down 12.51 percent. However, the value over the nine month period was 626.86 billion THB, up 3.6 percent.

The Thai Industries Sentiment Index dropped for the second month in a row, and local sales and export of automobiles also declined due to the sluggish economy, slow local consumption, fierce competition, liquidity problems and the doubted recovery of the global economy, according to Bangkok Post newspaper.

It is expected that the country's economic growth may reach less than 2 percent while export and automotive production have dropped for some consecutive months. FTI also cut its projected production of vehicles this year to 2.1 million units from 2.2 million due to weak domestic market.-VNA