Toyota says H1 China vehicle sales break even

SHANGHAI, July 7 (Reuters) - Toyota Motor Corp (7203.T) said on Tuesday its vehicle sales in China in the first half of 2009 were roughly unchanged compared with a year earlier.

Sales reached 284,000 units in the first six months of the year, the top Japanese automaker said in a statement on its Chinese website (www.toyota.com.cn), while sales in June were 57,000 units, up 33 percent year-on-year.

Toyota sold around 585,000 vehicles in China in 2008, up 17 percent on-year.

In the first six months last year, the Japanese automaker sold 285,000 vehicles in the country, up 34 percent from a year earlier and double the 17 percent growth rate of the overall market. (Reporting by Alfred Cang and Ben Blanchard)