Domestic cars drive up Türkiye's EV market

　　ANKARA, Sept. 27 (Xinhua) -- Türkiye's electric car market is booming in 2023 amid surging gasoline prices and the growing popularity of the country's first homegrown fully-electric car delivered early this year.

　　Some 22,900 electric vehicles (EVs) have been sold from January through August of this year, according to the data of the Automotive Distributors and Mobility Association published on Sept. 10.

　　Compared to the same period of last year this is a staggering increase of nearly 600 percent as only 3,283 EVs were sold in 2022, said the association.

　　Turkey's annual inflation approached 60 percent in August, pushing gasoline and diesel prices further upward, which helped create a bigger demand for EVs, especially for the high-income segments of the population, Emre Ozpeynirci, an Istanbul-based automotive industry expert and also a journalist, told Xinhua.

　　In addition, it has become expensive to own a car in Türkiye with prices for imported cars almost doubling in 2021 largely due to growing inflation. Türkiye also has one of the world's highest automobile tax.

　　Against this backdrop, Togg began delivering T10X, branded as a top sport utility car this April. The company managed to deliver 3,400 units by August, of which 1,965 were delivered in that month, making it a bestselling national brand in the electric car segment.

　　"There have been around 180,000 orders for the 20,000 Togg anticipated to be produced in 2023, hence the interest for electric cars in general," Ozpeynirci said.

　　Togg, a Turkish acronym of the Automobile Initiative Group of Türkiye, is a national project dear to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan who presented it as a symbol of his government's achievements for the centenary of the Turkish Republic in 2023. ■