Japan Demand for Cars to Hit Lowest in 31 years

Japanese demand for automobile in 2009 is forecasted to decrease below 5 million units for the first time in 31 years since 4.682 million units in 1978, according to Japan Automobile Manufacturers Association (JAMA) on Thursday. JAMA estimates that the demand in 2009 decreases to 4.68 million units by 4.9% from anticipated 5.112 million in 2008. The domestic demand for automobile decreases for 5 consecutive years in a row because of the reduction in personal consumption and lower company earnings from global recession.

JAMA estimates the domestic demand for passenger car decreases by 4.5% to 4.05 million units in 2009, by 5.6% to 0.796 million units for truck and by 8.4% to 14,100 units for bus from the forecast in 2008. Truck would decrease below 0.8 million units from the slow construction activities and lower company earnings. Mini-vehicle is also estimated to decrease by 1.6% to 1.853 million units from 2008 under downward trend.

The domestic demand for motorcycle in 2009 is estimated to decrease by 12.6% to 498,000 units from 570,000 in 2008 estimation, down by 21.1% compared with a year ago. The demand is estimated to decrease for 4 straight years compared with previous year.

Mr. Satoshi Aoki, Chairman of JAMA, commented that the current decrease of automobile sales over the world is without precedent in history. Automobile sales are declining widely in domestic and overseas market. The shipment of steel products for automobile in 2009 is likely to decrease more.