2025 To Be Year Of Electrification In Africa & South America – CleanTechnica

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In the EV world, I think most would agree that the biggest story of 2024 was the rapid scaling up of EV sales in China, particularly from future automotive king BYD. The Chinese EV market had been growing fast for years, and BYD had more than a decade of EV effort under its belt, but the degree to which sales grew in 2024 was astounding, and in months toward the end of the year, the country passed the notable milestone of more than 50% of new car sales having a plug.

In Europe, automakers are following the orders required of them by corporate average fuel economy (CAFE) standards. They sell more and more EVs — somehow — as they are required to do so. When they have a year of pause, they stall sales growth. Even as they hit their sales targets, they complain it’s all too fast, but they keep going and Europe isn’t far behind China in new vehicle electrification.

The US is … well, we’re in a weird phase of our country’s evolution in many regards, and we aren’t exactly eager to be leaders much of the time — preferring instead to cling to the past and dream of our global leadership in the mid-1900s or so. Electric vehicle sales continue to grow, but we are clearly in a different phase of development than Europe, not to mention China. We can’t even get to 10% EV market share yet.

All of those major auto markets will continue to progress at their own pace in 2025, but a variety of things have come together recently that got me thinking that the big story of 2025 in the EV world is going to be rapid electrification of auto markets in Africa and South America. Several countries on both of those continents seem primed for an EV boom, and Chinese automakers looking for more rapid growth in the next few years are entering markets in Africa and South America as quickly as flowers bloom in spring. Remeredzai Joseph Kuhudzai has been covering some of the fascinating developments in Africa and will continue to do so, and Juan Diego Celemín Mojica has been doing so in South America and will continue to do so. Focusing on Africa for a moment, here are some stories from the past few months that I think are big notable seeds that will lead to big things on the continent:

1. Ethiopia Says ICE Vehicle Import Ban Continues As Part of New Economic Reforms, Only EV Imports Allowed!
2. No Special Treatment When It Comes To ICE Ban, Ethiopia Tells Diplomats — They Can Only Buy EVs, Just Like Everybody Else!
3. Zimbabwe Reduces Import Duty On Electric Vehicles From 40% to 25% Starting January 1, 2025
4. Inchcape & BYD Partner In New Distribution Agreement For Ethiopia!
5. MojaEV Kenya Launches 100 NETA V Electric Cars for Nairobi Taxi Market
6. South Africa Introduces Tax Incentives to Encourage Local Production of Electric Vehicles
7. Electric Vehicles & Solar Can Help Reduce Zimbabwe’s Negative Trade Balance

But, overall, the keys are that Chinese EV producers are ready to sell a very large number of EVs abroad, smart non-oil countries are starting to realize they can save an enormous amount of money by not buying gasmobiles, and even smarter countries are seeing the opportunity to bring in various manufacturing jobs by building electric vehicles and their components locally. Electric vehicles are going to get more and more cost competitive, and I think 2025 could be a breakout year in several markets.