BEIJING -- Experts have said that the next ten years will be critical for China's electric car industry and urged greater efforts to boost the industry development.

They made the comments as the 2012 Chinese Auto Industry Development Report was released Monday. This is the fifth annual report on the country's auto industry development that has been released since 2008.

The report said the next 20 to 30 years will be a "critical period" that will witness the formation of a global new-energy vehicle industry, adding that major car-producing countries, such as the United States and Germany, have already made efforts to boost their respective electric car industries.

China has made big progress in electric car technologies but still lags behind other countries in certain areas, said the report, which was jointly released by the Research Department of Industrial Economics under the Development Research Center of the State Council, the Society of Automotive Engineers of China and Volkswagen China.

Gap in core technologies and the absence of mass production have caused the country's electric car sector to lag behind that of other nations, said report.

The report said only limited companies have participated in the construction of support facilities, such as charging stations. Data cited in the report indicated that only 168 charging stations had been built in 25 trial cities as of the end of last year.

"The next ten years will be critical for China's electric car industry," said Feng Fei, head of the the Research Department of Industrial Economics under the Development Research Center of the State Council.

"The focus of industrialization should be electric cars and attention should be paid to the development of hybrid cars as transition technologies," Feng said.