MOSCOW. April 10 (Interfax) - Russian car makers lag behind their foreign rivals, and the share of domestic cars on the Russian market has reduced, Russian First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov said.

"So far our cars cannot compete with foreign manufacturers," Ivanov said at a meeting with Russian car makers on Thursday.

The Russian car industry has recently seen a steady growth by 8-10%, he added.

"But it remains an obvious fact: the share of domestically produced cars continues to decrease," Ivanov said, adding that this was the result of serious competition.

Overall, production of cars in Russia over the past seven years has doubled, with about 1,290,000 of them produced in 2007, he said.

"At the same time, sales of Russian cars compared to 2006 continued to go down," Ivanov said.