The car industry in the United Kingdom is moving away from diesel vehicles to petrol and electric cars as the sales of mid-range diesel cars declined sharply last year, dropping by £3.3 billion to £6.444 billion in 2018 falling by 34 percent from 2017’s figure of £9.758 billion
New figures from the Office for National Statistics in the UK shows that this came as the total value of UK manufacturers’ product sales in 2018 was £390.1 billion increasing by a 2.5 percent over the 2017 total of £380.7 billion.
Sales of mid-range diesel cars with engines between 1.5 litres and 2.5 litres, peaked in 2016 at 630,000 vehicles, worth £10.625 billion.The number fell to 535,000 cars in 2017, representing 15.1 percent. In 2018 however, only 352,000 cars were sold, down 34.3 percent on the previous year and down 44.2 percent on the 2016 peak.
Meanwhile, the sale of petrol-engined cars rose from 867,000 vehicles in 2016 to 1.060 million in 2018, an increase of 22.3 percent.
For 2018, the UK Office for National Statistics stated that the largest value increase in sales came from the manufacture of food products, up £1.9 billion (2.6 percent) to £71.8 billion in 2018 reflecting growth across most industries within this division.
Manufacturing of machinery and equipment not elsewhere classified also experienced a large value increase in sales between 2017 and 2018, up £1.8 billion (6.8 percent) to £27.9 billion.
In the period also,manufacture of motor vehicles, trailers and semi-trailers experienced its first decline in sales since 2009: sales declined by £0.8 billion, a drop of 1.3 percent.
The UK manufacturers’ sales by product (ProdCom) presents annual statistics on the value and volume of products manufactured in the UK. The ProdCom statistics concern all manufactured products included in the EU ProdCom list.
The survey covers UK businesses active in the mining, quarrying and manufacturing sectors and does not cover recycling or energy products.
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