The FCAI, the peak body for Australia’s automotive industry, has today released sales figures for the 2021 calendar year.
A total of 1,049,831 vehicles were sold across Australia in 2021, which represents a 14.5 per cent increase on 2020.
FCAI Chief Executive Tony Weber said that in the context of pandemic restrictions limiting access to dealerships and international supply issues, the new vehicle market in Australia remains positive.
“Despite the pandemic restricting access to showrooms in 2021, Australian consumers found ways to purchase new vehicles and did so in solid numbers,” Mr Weber said.
“The global shortage of microprocessors, compounded by the pandemic, had an impact on the number of cars sold throughout Australia. Automotive manufacturers are continuing to work to strengthen supply chains in 2022.”
Lowering CO2 Emissions
Electric vehicles saw an increase in sales of 191.1 per cent on 2020 figures.
“While this number may appear impressive, it is important to note that overall electric vehicle sales as reported through VFACTS account for just 0.49 per cent of the total market share.”
“In this context, we must recognise the policy objective should be to lower our CO2 emissions rather than meeting sales targets of particular types of technology. The FCAI maintains the need for national leadership in the form of a technology agnostic and achievable emissions reduction target,” Mr Weber said.
This is consistent with the FCAI’s voluntary CO2 emissions standard for Australia’s new vehicle industry which was released in 2021.
“Give us the target and we will give you the technology mix to get there,” Mr Weber added.
Full year 2021 figures
The preference for SUVs and light commercial vehicles has continued to increase throughout 2021. A total of 531,700 SUVs were sold, which is a 16.9 per cent increase on 2020. Light commercials are up 23.2 per cent on last year’s figures with a total of 253,254 vehicles sold.
Passenger vehicles totalled 221,556 sold throughout the year, which is a decrease of 0.2 per cent on 2020 figures.
Toyota was the highest selling brand for the year, with 223,642 vehicles sold resulting in 21.3 per cent of overall market share. In second place was Mazda (101,119 vehicles sold, 9.6 per cent market share). In third place was Hyundai (72,872 vehicles sold, 6.9 per cent). In fourth place was Ford (71,380 vehicles sold, 6.8 per cent market share). Fifth place went to Kia (67,964 vehicles sold, 6.5 per cent market share).
VFACTS DECEMBER 2021
Summary by Class:
Key Points:
- The December 2021 market of 78,402 new vehicle sales is a decrease of 17,250 vehicle sales or 18.0% on December 2020 (95,652) vehicle sales. December 2021 had 24 selling days compared to December 2020 with 23, but this resulted in a decrease of 892 vehicle sales per day.
- The Passenger Vehicle Market is down by 5,481 vehicle sales (-27.4%) over the same month last year; the Sports Utility Market is down by 9,125 vehicle sales (-18.4%); the Light Commercial Market is down by 2,759 vehicle sales (-12.2%) and the Heavy Commercial Vehicle Market is up by 115 vehicle sales (3.3%) versus December 2020.
- Toyota was market leader in December, followed by Mazda and Hyundai. Toyota led Mazda with a margin of 9,159 vehicle sales and 11.7 market share points.