Mubasher: The European car market grew slightly in 2018, despite contractions in the last four months owing to a new emission test, official data showed on Wednesday.

Over the course of the previous year, Europe’s car sales edged 0.1% to 15.2 million passenger cars, extending the fifth straight year of expansion, the European Automobile Manufacturers Association (ACEA) stated.

The modest upturn came despite the declines seen in the last four months, including an 8.4% plunge last December, the tougher new Worldwide Harmonised Light Vehicle Test Procedure (WLTP) which became mandatory from the beginning of September 2018.

The introduction of the new standards boosted sales in August 2018 by around one-third, as auto manufacturers offered incentives to clear an inventory of vehicles that did not comply with the new emission rules.

Demand was mainly fuelled countries in Central Europe, where car sales climbed 8% last year.

While new car registrations grew by 3% and 7% in Spain and France respectively over the last year, sales declined by a marginal 0.2%, dropped by 3.1% in Italy and 6.8% in the UK.

Sales of Europe’s biggest car manufacturer Volkswagen (VW) edged up 0.9% to a total of 3.61 million units in 2018, despite tumbling 8.7% month-on-month last December, the ACEA said.

Germany’s BMW saw a sales decline of 0.9% last year, with a total of 989,688 sold cars, while sales at its compatriot Daimler dropped 1.9% to 935,057.