Japan's carmakers have said parts shortages are beginning to affect production in China, but maintained that sales will not be seriously affected.

Toyota is planning to cut production in China in half, as well as implementing a 70 per cent cut at its plants in North America, until June 3rd.

It will also bring forward the summer breaks for Chinese part-producing plants to late April or early May.

The parts shortage has been prompted by manufacturing losses caused by the earthquake and tsunami which devastated parts of Japan last month.

In spite of the disruption, Japan's three major automakers - Toyota, Nissan and Honda - all reaffirmed their commitment to the world's motor industry at the Shanghai Motor Show this week, each saying they stood by their 2011 sales targets for China.

"We're not standing down on our sales target of 1.15 million vehicles in China for this year," said Kimiyasu Nakamura, chief executive officer of Nissan's Chinese joint venture Dongfeng.

He added that Nissan will make up for lost output in the second half of the business year, beginning in October, when most carmakers expect the supply chain disruptions caused by the quake to be resolved.

Meanwhile, Masayoshi Hori, an executive at Toyota's China division, said the ongoing problems have the potential to affect automakers all over the world, not just Japanese ones.

Shortages of electronics, rubber and resin-based parts have already affected companies like Ford and Peugeot Citroen.

"In that sense, it's more realistic to pour our efforts into helping those suppliers, like Renesas, restore its disrupted production," added Mitsubishi Motors president Osamu Masuko, referring to the market-leading producer of microcontroller chip components.

Hyundai Motor, the world's fifth-largest carmaker, said this week that it is considering building a fourth car plant in China to capitalise on the country's fast-growing market.

Sources:



Japanese automakers shield China from supply disruption (20/04/11)



Toyota extends US production cuts due to parts shortage (20/04/11)



Toyota Motor to cut production at China plants until early June (19/04/11)
 

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