Toyota March sales in China up 19 pct

Japan's Toyota Motor Corp and its two local joint venture partners sold about 90,400 automobiles in China in March, up 19 percent from a year earlier, the automaker said on Tuesday.

That followed a 43.1 percent year-on-year jump in February and a 18.1 percent rise in January.

In the first three months of the year, Japan's biggest automaker sold 227,900 vehicles, up 23.4 percent from a year earlier.

Toyota this year aims to sell more than 1.1 million vehicles in China. If accomplished, the company would meet the objective to sell 1 million vehicles a year in China, which it had originally targeted for 2010.

Last year, Toyota sold 917,500 vehicles in China.

Toyota operates joint ventures in China with China FAW Group Corp and Guangzhou Automobile Group.