New vehicle registrations fall in first five months in Oman

Muscat: The total number of vehicles registered for road use in the Sultanate stood at 1.46 million by the end of May 2018, according to the latest statistics released by the National Centre for Statistics and Information (NCSI).
In addition, new vehicle registrations in the Sultanate stood at 26,311 during the first five months of 2018, down by 15.8 per cent from 31,263 new registrations for the same period of the previous year.
This does not include vehicles that were re-exported or given temporary registrations.
Most of the categories, including private vehicles, commercial vehicles and taxis, witnessed a fall in new registrations during January-May period of 2018, shows the NCSI data, which was prepared based on preliminary information from the Royal Oman Police (ROP).
Among different categories, private vehicle and commercial vehicle registrations were down by 18.1 per cent and 8.3 per cent at 18,488 and 5,523, respectively, during January-May period of 2018.
Registrations of car rental companies and taxis were also down by 16.7 per cent and 11.8 per cent to 1,681 and 134, respectively, during the five-month period, the NCSI report said.
However, registrations of driving school vehicles and diplomatic vehicles showed a robust growth of 19.2 per cent and 4.3 per cent to 87 and 24, respectively between January and May this year.
New registrations for motorbikes also eased by 3 per cent to 287 bikes, from 296 motorbikes during January-May period under review.
Also, new registrations of government vehicles and tractors declined by 12.2 per cent and 11.1 per cent to 79 and 8, respectively.
The Sultanate’s total vehicle registrations in 2017 touched 78,205, which included 58,596 private cars. Oman imports vehicles for domestic sales and for re-exports to regional markets.