Japan's car sales see first rise in seven years

A popular government subsidy aimed at boosting Japan's car makers helped the sector record its first annual gain in new sales for seven years, an industry group said Wednesday. However December sales tumbled almost a third year-on-year as the subsidies, introduced by the government in the aftermath of the global downturn, came to an end in September.
The number of new cars, trucks and buses excluding mini vehicles sold in the country last year came to 3,229,716 units, up 10.6 percent from 2,921,085 the previous year, according to the Japanese Automobile Dealers Association. Toyota's Prius petrol-electric hybrid car, low on greenhouse gas emissions, has been Japan's top-selling car for about one and a half years.
In 2010 the world's biggest automaker sold more than 315,000 units of the Prius in Japan, making it the best-selling car in the country for a single year, a record set by the company's Corolla in 1990. The association said the sector's gain in 2010 was mainly due to a popular subsidy to encourage motorists to buy eco-friendly cars, which lifted demand and tempered the crippling effects of the financial crisis.