SHANGHAI, China (AP) — Ford Motor opened dozens of new dealerships in China yesterday, expanding its reach into provincial cities as it courts new car buyers.

The automaker inaugurated 40 new dealerships out of 66 it will open before the end of the year. For 2010 it planed to open a total of 100 dealerships, raising the total number of its outlets to 340.

China’s car market is the world’s biggest, and sales are growing fastest in the provincial cities as the benefits of the country’s economic boom spread from its east coast to the interior where millions of new and potential car buyers live.

Ford is forecasting record sales for this year, though it got a later start and has a smaller presence in China than rival General Motors.

The company earlier reported its China sales in January-October surged 39 per cent to 468,754.

Tax cuts and subsidies for energy-efficient vehicles helped spur sales of minivans and other small cars last year. This year, demand for bigger class vehicles and imported models has rebounded as car owners upgraded.

Passenger car sales rose 36 per cent over a year earlier during the first 10 months of the year, to 11.1 million vehicles, according to the China Passenger Car Association.

Ford marked yesterday’s new openings with a celebration in Nanning, a city in southern China well beyond the traditional big markets in Beijing, Shanghai and other eastern coastal cities.

“Following the call to ‘go west,’ we are expanding west and in developing cities in China where most of the future growth here in the world’s largest automotive market will come from,” said Joe Hinrichs, president of Ford, Asia Pacific and Africa, and chairman and CEO of Ford China.

Hinrichs said the company expects record sales for the Asian-Pacific and African regions this year, having sold 731,724 vehicles in those areas from January-October, up 39 per cent from a year earlier.

The company says it expects 70 per cent of its growth in the coming decade from those developing markets.