Shanghai and Dalian ports should have enough capacity to prevent a severe logistical problem for Japanese car manufacturer in world’s biggest auto market
REUTERS IN BEIJING
PUBLISHED : Wednesday, 19 August, 2015, 4:54pm
UPDATED : Wednesday, 19 August, 2015, 5:32pm
The site of the deadly blasts at the port of Tianjin, which is the main car import terminal for China, the world's biggest auto market. Photo: Xinhua
Toyota Motor Corp could divert shipments from China’s Tianjin port where operations have been disrupted indefinitely after last week’s deadly explosions that have killed at least 114 people.
An aerial view showing the site of August 12's deadly blasts in the port area of Tianjin. Photo: Reuters
A senior Beijing-based executive at the Japanese company said on Wednesday that other ports could be used for future shipments.
Shanghai and Dalian ports should have enough capacity to prevent a severe logistical problem for Toyota in the world’s biggest auto market, the executive said.
The port of Tianjin will likely be unusable for a long while, although I have no idea at the moment how long these disruptions will last ... there are a lot of unknowns at this time
UNNAMED TOYOTA EXECUTIVE
Global carmakers are facing the partial shutdown of China’s main car import terminal.
“The port of Tianjin will likely be unusable for a long while, although I have no idea at the moment how long these disruptions will last," the official told Reuters, declining to be named as he was not authorised to speak with reporters.
“There are a lot of unknowns at this time.”
A company spokesman in Japan confirmed Toyota was considering rerouting cars to other ports.
Investigators have not determined the cause of the blasts at the world’s 10th-largest port, which is the gateway to China’s industrial northeast.
It could take at least a couple of months for normal port operations in Tianjin to resume, research company IHS Automotive said.
In addition to Toyota, carmakers such as Volkswagen and BMW said they had made moves to switch shipments to Shanghai and other ports in the aftermath of the explosions.
Toyota’s two final assembly plants near the port suspended their operations from Monday to Wednesday – in part to assess the damage caused by the blasts.
Toyota produced 432,340 vehicles at the two plants in Tianjin last year, according to IHS.
It estimated a production loss of 2,200 cars per day as a result of the explosions.
The port accounts for about 40 per cent of China’s imported cars, the research firm said.
http://m.scmp.com/news/china/economy/article/1850838/deadly-blasts-tianjin-mean-toyota-likely-divert-vehicle-shipments
