MOSCOW — Buoyed by the success of Germany’s scrappage program, Russia said it would kick-start a local version of the Cash for Clunkers program next year, in an effort to rejuvenate the country’s rickety automotive industry and stimulate demand for new cars.
The pilot program, to be tested first in key industrial cities like Moscow, St. Petersburg, Samara and Nizhny Novgorod, would enable owners of Russian-made cars that are older than 10 years to trade in their worn-out vehicles in return for a certificate for 50,000 rubles ($1,550), which can be used to buy new locally produced cars.
Foreign automakers such as Ford, GM, Nissan and Renault with local assembly plants are expected to benefit from the trade-in, as owners of worn-out cars would be required to purchase newer, fuel-efficient made-in-Russia models.
At present, about half of the entire Russian automotive fleet is more than 10 years old, while approximately 400,000 cars nominally registered with the country’s traffic police have been abandoned or otherwise dismantled.
About 7 percent of Russia’s 30 million cars becomes clunkers annually, analysts said, but no attempts have been made to recycle and owners often abandon old vehicles after removing useful spare parts.
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Too funny….cash for clunker plan Russian style. A car crusher right at the end of the Lada assembly line. Just one gigantic never ending govenment funded roundabout. Heck, this has got Obamaski written all over it.
I first heard of it yesterday on Fox News and I nearly fell out of my chair laughing. Today I looked it up and I’m still going into hysterics.
I knew you’d like Fox…in more ways than one. My wife didn’t like it at first but she would endure it with me…..I began to notice a subtle change and now she likes it a lot and can appreciate the huge difference between Fox’s ‘We Report You Decide’ and ’here’s the only side of the story we want you to see and hear’ as is almost always the case with the other networks.
I wonder where they’re going to get the rubles? Maybe they’ll issue I-O-Rubles?