Japan: Toyota cuts output auto plan again as semi-conductor shortage lingers

The ongoing shortage of parts supplies including automotive semi-conductors has prompted Toyota Motor, Japan's largest automaker, to quietly revise its domestic production plan for this month even lower, providing more unwelcome news for the country's integrated and special steel producers.

Mysteel Global learned that Toyota had informed its component suppliers that it plans to produce about 240,000 units in 20 days of operations at its domestic plants this month, for about 12,000 units per day, representing a further decline from its earlier production forecasts announced several weeks ago.

In late October, the company was expecting to produce about 280,000 units in December over the 20 operating days, down by 13% from the plan the company had released in September, as Mysteel Global reported. Then on November 22, it announced a further downward revision.

"We at Toyota would like to again apologize for the repeated adjustments to our production plan due to the parts shortage resulting from the spread of COVID-19," the company announced.

"The planned global production volume for December is expected to be approximately 750,000 units (approx. 250,000 units in Japan and 500,000 units overseas). As for the full-year production forecast for FY'23, we have taken future risks such as the shortage of semi-conductors into account and announced 9.2 million units," it declared.

The company said it would be suspending domestic operations this month on four assembly lines at three plants (out of 28 lines in 14 plants), affecting production of several models including its popular Lexus and Land Cruiser Prado vehicles.

This week however, Toyota has revised this month's target further downwards, suggesting that its component supply headaches continue.

Nevertheless, the company continues to expect to be producing over 14,000 units/day next month in 17 days (allowing for holidays for Japan's Oshogatsu New Year celebrations) and over 15,000 units/day in February over 20 days.

In October, according to the latest data from Japan Iron & Steel Federation (JISF), Japan produced 747,300 tonnes of galvanized sheets, up by a large 5.1% from September and by 1.2% from October last year.

Japan's major automakers saw their combined production rise by 14.4% on year in October to 2.11 million units, as the pandemic's grip on supply chains at that time had eased.

However, the brief rise in galvanized sheet sales in October could not offset the large decline of 14.5% on year during January-October to 6.97 million tonnes, the JISF statistics showed.

The most recent data from Japan Automobile Manufacturers Association showed that during January-September this year, the automakers produced 5.67 million cars, trucks and buses at their plants in Japan, off by 3.2% on year.

Written by Russ McCulloch, russ.mcculloch@mysteel.com

Note: This article has been written in accordance with an article exchange agreement between Mysteel Global and SteelMint.