Honda November China car sales jump 36 pct yr/yr

SHANGHAI, Dec 17 (Reuters) - Japan's Honda Motor (7267.T) said on Monday its car sales in mainland China in November rose 36.4 percent from a year earlier, beating 16.6 percent growth in the country's overall car market.

Honda, Japan's second-biggest car maker whose models include the Accord, Civic and Odyssey, sold 46,226 cars in China in November, it said in a statement.

Sales at Guangzhou Honda, its joint venture with Guangzhou Automobile Group Co. -- parent of Hong Kong-listed Denway Motors (0203.HK) -- climbed 23.4 percent to 32,400 units during the month.

Sales at its venture with Dongfeng Motor (0489.HK), based in the central Chinese province of Hubei, jumped 81.3 percent to 13,826 units, it said.

In the January-November period Honda's car sales in mainland China rose 31.6 percent from a year earlier to 378,602.

A senior Honda executive told Reuters in April that his firm expected to sell roughly 400,000 cars in China this year, up 24 percent from 2006.

It aims to capture at least 10 percent of the China market by the end of this decade, up from around 7.5 percent last year. (Reporting by Fang Yan; Editing by Edmund Klamann)