The European Union has reportedly granted Spain permission to offer another series of low-interest loans to automakers operating within its borders. The money is to be used to further various automaker's investments into products that meet the EU's environmental standards, which seems like a pretty broad standard to us. These loans are in addition to the €4 billion (£3.7 billion, $5.3 billion U.S.) of monetary assistance the Spanish government offered automakers for the protection of jobs and to minimize plant closures.
There was some speculation that the European Union would put a stop to the practice of offering financial assistance to automakers by individual member countries, but in the end, the desire to support the development of environmentally friendly automobiles won out and both sets of loans were approved.
Last month, new car sales fell by over 38 percent in Spain compared to March of 2008. Although that's still bad, it's an improvement over the February's drop of nearly 50 percent, year-to-year. The improvement has been attributed to the adoption of car scrapping incentives in Spain.
[Source: Autocar]
There was some speculation that the European Union would put a stop to the practice of offering financial assistance to automakers by individual member countries, but in the end, the desire to support the development of environmentally friendly automobiles won out and both sets of loans were approved.
Last month, new car sales fell by over 38 percent in Spain compared to March of 2008. Although that's still bad, it's an improvement over the February's drop of nearly 50 percent, year-to-year. The improvement has been attributed to the adoption of car scrapping incentives in Spain.
[Source: Autocar]
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