New car sales are expected to increase in Croatia next year as the country ends import custom duties on all cars manufactured in the EU.

Some experts are predicting that new car sales will rise next year in Croatia to about 75,000 units, an increase on last year's sales of 57,758 units.

In the first seven months of this year, sales reached about 35,000 units - an increase of more than 38% compared to the same period last year and the highest percentage increase in central and Eastern Europe.

The market leader in Croatia is Renault, which has a 14% market share. The French manufacturer is followed by Volkswagen (10.5%) and Opel (10.1%).

In sales per 1,000 people in January to July 2001, Croatia had 3.9 units. This is a good result compared to 3.8 in the Czech Republic, 3.7 in Hungary, 2.9 in Slovakia, 2.6 in Poland, 2.4 in Estonia, 0.8 in Romania, 0.7 in Latvia, 0.4 in Lithuania and 0.3 in Bulgaria.

Only Slovenia achieved a better result with 8.5 units per 1,000 people. (September 2001)