Auto industry growth set to slow

China's automotive industry is shifting from superfast expansion to slow growth, after the country's car market already reached an immense scale in production and sales volume, the nation's top industry regulator said on Tuesday.

Xin Guobin, vice-minister of industry and information technology, said car sales account for the lion's share of China's overall retail market and play a major part in the industrial economy.

"The recent slow expansion in car sales was chiefly because more than 29.4 million automobiles were sold in China in 2017. It would be very difficult to continue robust momentum on the basis of such a big number," Xin said at a news conference in Beijing.