MENA 2018. Saudi Arabia & Israel dragged the market down 5.2%

MENA Car Market in 2018 fell down 5.2% with 1.922.590 sales, signing the fourth consecutive year of decline, having lost over 1 million sales from the 2014 record. Saudi Arabia has dragged down the region, while Algeria and Iraq are recovering.

Economic Environment

Growth in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region rebounded to an average of 2% in 2018, up from an average 1.4% in 2017. The modest rebound in growth is driven mostly by the recent rise in oil prices, which has benefitted the region’s oil exporters while putting pressure on the budgets of oil importers. The rebound also reflects the impact of modest reforms and stabilization efforts undertaken in some countries in the region. The report forecasts that regional growth will continue to improve modestly, to an average of 2.8% by the end of 2020 while there is the ongoing risk that instability in the region could worsen and dampen growth.

Market Trend

The automotive industry in the Middle East and North Africa region has stopped its growth in the 2014, immediately after having hit the 3 million units milestone for the first time.

Since 2014 the market declined to 2.02 million units in the 2017 and will further lose this year.

The key reason of the decline is related to the fall of oil price in the international market, which created deficit in Gulf countries, moving governments to apply restrictive economic policy and to increase taxes, with VAT introduced for the first time in Saudi Arabia and UAE. Additional reason for the Algerian market fall are related to the new automotive national plan, introduced in the 2014, which killed the market.

In the 2018 data report sales volume at 1.92 million (-5.3%) with the regional performance dragged down by heavy lost in Saudi Arabia, down 22.1%, and in the second largest market, Israel, down 5.7%. On positive tone Algeria, thanks to the start-up of several local plants and up 27.9%, and Iraq, after the end of civil war, up 45.3%