Gasgoo.com (Shanghai July 13) - The southern Chinese city of Guiyang in Guizhou province has followed Beijing to become the second city in the country to enact a registration plate lottery, caijing.com.cn reported today.
The new policy, which will force buyers of new vehicles to first win a new license plate via a lottery, came into effect officially yesterday. The city will distinguish between 'special' and 'regular' plates. Special plates will only be limited to residents of the city, while regular plates have no such restriction. However, regular plate holders will not be able to drive within the city's first ring. Guiyang will reportedly only issue 2,000 new plates per month.
The legislation, which mimics policies enacted in Beijing at the start of the year, will no doubt affect the local automobile industry. There has recently been rumors that no such policies would be coming to the city, which has caused the number of new vehicle purchases to rise dramatically.
Swiss UBS Securities Company has said that the Central Bank has felt definite economic strain from recent policies limiting vehicle purchases. According to statistics from the China Automobile Dealers Association, there have been around 150,000 new car sales in Beijing since the start of the year, over 220,000 vehicles, or 60 percent, less than during the first six months of 2010.
According to a report appearing on ennweekly.com, although the government had no plan to abandon vehicle purchase limitation policies in Beijing, there was no plan to have similar legislation appear in other cities. However, the severity of traffic congestion problems has led other areas to consider finding similar ways to deal with their problems.
"This is something that shouldn't have happened," said Assistant Secretary of the China Passenger Car Association Cui Dongshu. Mr. Cui said that Guiyang, as a relatively underdeveloped region, would encourage other cities to consider implementing similar policies to curb traffic problems.
