BEIJING -- China's auto sales in March slid 11.7 percent year-on-year to 2.23 million units, data from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers showed Monday.

Auto sales in the January-March period totaled 6.51 million units, up 0.2 percent year-on-year, according to the data.

In March alone, sales of passenger vehicles went down 0.6 percent year-on-year to 1.86 million units.

Sales of new energy vehicles, however, sustained a rapid pace of growth, surging 116 percent year-on-year.

The country's carmakers manufactured 2.24 million vehicles in March, representing a decline of 9.1 percent year-on-year, the association said.

Auto exports went up 28.8 percent from a year earlier to 170,000 units last month, bringing total exports in the first quarter to 582,000 units, up 58.3 percent year-on-year.

The CAAM said that an increasingly complicated external environment, the resurgence of domestic COVID-19 outbreaks, along with factors including a chip shortage and the rising costs of raw materials, have weighed on factory production and the business operations of the auto industry.

The association expects more preferential policies such as bigger tax and fee cuts and other measures to boost the auto sector.