The auto industry continues to suffer exchange rate and the commercial debt with their parent companies and foreign suppliers: in this context of declining production due to lack of parts, more than demandadded vehicle manufacturing 37,491 units in February, 19% below the same month the previous year, as reported by the Automobile Manufacturers Association (ADEFA).
In the first two months of the year the terminals produced 60,134 vehicleswhich represents a drop of 18.20% compared to the same period of the previous year.
Although sales at local dealerships have also fallen by almost 30% this year due to lower demand from the public, in the case of vehicle production (60% of which is for export) this is mainly due to the fact that many factories they produced less or didn’t work at all throughout the last month, due to not having the necessary parts, as declared by ADEFA itself in a press release.
“With 13 working days of activity, five days less than last year, February had the particularity of registration the prolonged shutdown for holidays and the need to replenish stocks”, ADEFA noted. Four of nine terminals producing light and utility vehicles did not operate last month or did so at half capacity.
In fact, two of the car manufacturers, Volkswagen and General Motorslast month they didn’t produce any vehicles.
General Pacheco’s Volkswagen plant, where it produces the Amarok and Taos models, has come out of the holidays scheduled for January and plans to resume operations in the first week of February. But due to the lack of spare parts, the subsidiary of the German car manufacturer has decided to extend the holiday period of its staff until March 11th.
“All this time they have been working to resolve the debt problem with suppliers,” a company source said.
General Motors It also decided to extend the holiday period for the entire month of February, which ended on Monday 4th. The factory located in the town of General Alvear, on the outskirts of Rosario, produces the Tracker model.
Two more brands working together on the same pickup production line, Renault and Nissan, gave a holiday to the staff of the Santa Isabel factory in Córdoba who work on the pick-up assembly line. “The truck plant was stopped until February 28, while the Sandero, Stepway, Logan and Kangoo vehicle lines returned from holiday on January 29 and worked with a few days off, but have remained active until today” .
One of the tools that car manufacturers have used or at least analyzed to regularize the debt accumulated since March 2022 with their external suppliers was the issue of bonds Bopreal. Toyota Argentina has signed approx $1 billion of that bond which, according to its directors, allowed it to offer support to the parent company to secure the supply of parts and resume production in early February.
Other car manufacturers, including Volkswagen and Stellantis (owner of the Fiat and Peugeot factories in Argentina) has also analyzed the purchase of Bopreal, according to its directors.
For the president of ADEFA, Martin Zuppithis decline in production due to shortages could begin to reverse this month.
“To make more precise projections and analyzes regarding the behavior and expected trend of the year It is necessary to wait for the development of the first quarter. In the meantime it is necessary to continue to work jointly with the value chain and the Government on the sector’s agenda to identify the tools that allow us to improve competitiveness,” said Zuppi.
Against this backdrop of declining production, automotive companies exported in February 23,584 vehicles, almost the same figure (-1.6%) as in February last year. In the first two months of the year, vehicle sales abroad amounted to 38,886, with an increase of 10.1% compared to the same period of the previous year.
“We are currently going through a process of macroeconomic organization that has an impact on the internal market and we at ADEFA understand this “It is essential to continue strengthening exports,” Zuppi stated that “this path is essential for the sector because in the short and medium term it is what will allow it to support employment and production in the face of a shrinking domestic market”.
The manager, who heads the Stellantis branch in Argentina, added: “Given the profile of our sector, we will be able to consolidate foreign exchange earnings and diversify external markets in line with the National Plan for the Promotion of Exports and Investments 2024 presented by Chancellor Diana Mondino.”
In wholesale sales, the sector sold 33,234 units to the dealer network in February (10.3% more than the same previous month) and the cumulative January-February produced 49,176 units, 5.90% more less than in the first two months of the previous year.
Source: Clarin
