Page 20 - bne_Magazine_March_2018

20 I Companies & Markets bne March 2018
Kazakh car output triples in January
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Kazakh automakers produced 2,105 cars in January, tripling the output rate compared to January last year, the car manufacturers' union, KazAutoProm, said on September 20.
The tripling in output suggests a recovery in Kazakh car production supported by an improving appetite for buying cars in Kazakhstan amid recovering economic growth –GDP growth stood at 4% in 2017, compared to just 1% in 2016.
Most cars produced in the month were light commercial vehicles, which made up 2,041 units, while trucks accounted for 52 units.
Kazakhstan is home to car plants owned by Azia Auto, Saryarka Autoprom and Agromash Holding. All three carmakers produce foreign car brands, including Lada, Kia, Hyundai, Skoda, JAC, Geely, Chevrolet, Peugeot, Toyota and SsangYong.
Sales of passenger cars and light commercial vehicles in Kazakhstan – both domestically assembled and imported – grew by a third (36.5%) y/y to 3,122 units in January, KazAutoProm said earlier. Approximately 60.3% of cars sold by Kazakh dealers in January were imported cars (1,883), while the remaining 39.7% (1,239) accounted for domestically manufactured cars.
Car sales were led by Russian Lada (785) followed by Japan’s Toyota brand (665 units) and Uzbekistan’s Ravon Nexia (492).
KazAutoProm reported earlier that Kazakh citizens spent more than $1.12bn on new passenger cars and light commercial vehicles in 2017, up by 28.6% y/y.
In a joint statement on February 6, Bankwatch, Counter Bal- ance, Friends of the Earth Europe and 350.org criticised the institutions promoting or financing the corridor for failing to actively publicise a climate impact assessment of the project.
“This is symptomatic that the Southern Gas Corridor has been approved without EU institutions disclosing its climate impact,” commented Anna Roggenbuck, EIB policy officer with CEE Bankwatch Network.
“The European Investment Bank is now shamelessly locking Europe into decades of fossil fuel dependency even as the window for fossil fuel use is slamming shut,” added Colin Roche, extractives campaigner for Friends of the Earth Europe. “The bank’s biggest ever investment in dangerous fossil fuels undermines the EU’s commitment to climate action when we urgently need to be transitioning to a fossil free future.”
The project is also backed by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), which announced in December it is providing a €500mn loan to the project operator.
The 878km TAP will stretch from the Greek-Turkish border to Italy after crossing Greece, Albania and the Adriatic Sea. The pipeline will be supplied with natural gas from the second stage of the Shah Deniz gas field development in the Azerbaijani section of the Caspian Sea. Its initial capacity will be 10bn cubic meters of natural gas per annum.
In its latest update in mid-January, operator TAP AG said that around 90% of the pipeline route had been cleared in Greece and Albania.
“The European Investment Bank
is now shamelessly locking
Europe into decades of fossil fuel dependency even as the window for fossil fuel use is slamming shut”
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