Toyota Motor Corp. said on Wednesday that it expected the global sales of its gas-electric hybrid cars to reach about 430,000 units in 2007, marking a year-on-year rise of 40 percent.

If the goal were reached, the largest Japanese vehicle manufacturer, which introduced the Prius as the world's first hybrid car for commercial production in 1997, would see its accumulated global sales of hybrid cars reach 1.3 million units and would turn to be the first automaker in the world boasting hybrid vehicle sales exceeding 1 million units.

Toyota's global sales of hybrid cars in 2006 climbed 33 percent to 312,500 units. Among them, 72,400 units were sold domestically and 240,000 units in overseas markets, up 24 percent and 36 percent respectively.

The company attributed the sales increase to consumers' mounting favor in fuel-efficient vehicles because of surging gasoline price around the world.

In spite of being in the dominating position in the hybrid vehicle field, Toyota said it is still trying to improve the batteries and aims to achieve annual sales of over 1 million units for the high-end cars in early 2010s.

Source: Xinhua