The much awaited revised National Automative Policy (NAP) that was unveiled by the Minister of International Trade and Industry (Miti) Datuk Seri Mustapha Mohamed on Jan 21 has a 5-year-plan until 2018 to reduce car prices.

However, the targeted lower prices of cars by at least 20% to 30% would not be brought about by lower excise duties but by further liberalisation of the auto sector .

The main thrust of the revised NAP is to make Malaysia the regional automotive hub for the production of Energy Efficient Vehicles (EEV) which includes electrical and hybrid vehicles.

The government hopes to issue three to four manufacturing licenses for EEV until 2018. In an effort to boost the funding for the production of EEV’s, the government would provide funding of RM2.07 billion over seven years to attract domestic and foreign investments into the segment.

In an effort to boost the attractiveness of Malaysia as a regional hub for the production of EEV’s, Mustapha said that there will be no preconditions to the award of the manufacturing licenses.

In a move to spur local production of EEV’s, the government has decided to abolish the excise duty and import tax exemptions for hybrid and electric vehicles. However locally assembled hybrid cars will enjoy the exemption until Dec 31, 2015 and local electrical car will be exempted until Dec 31, 2017.

The rationale for this move is that imported cars do not contribute significantly to the Malaysian economy.

One of the drawbacks of the electric car is the time taken to charge the battery. If the technology to charge the battery of the electrical car is improved , then it is expected that the demand for electrical vehicles will be stronger.

With the emphasis on EEV, would you as a consumer, purchase an electric car?

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