Toyota to resume production in more plants
Toyota Motor says it aims to restart assembly lines starting April 18th at most of its factories in Japan, after suspending production due to the March 11th earthquake.
The automaker stopped production at all plants across the country, except at 2 factory locations, after the disaster last month.
Toyota says it now sees promising developments in the securing of supplies of parts. It also wants to avoid any major impact on dealers and parts makers that would result from a further suspension in output.
The automaker says it will cut production for the time being, saying it is still difficult to secure certain parts. The firm projects it will take considerable time until output returns to pre-disaster levels.
Toyota had planned to close a subsidiary plant near Tokyo at the end of last month to transfer the production capacity to a new plant in the quake-hit area.
But it now says it will temporarily reschedule the closing of the plant near Tokyo and produce vehicles already ordered.
Other Japanese automakers remain unable to set schedules for the resumption of full-fledged production.
In addition, the possible regulation of electricity use in the coming summer season is likely to adversely affect car production in Japan.
Wednesday, April 06, 2011 19:17 +0900 (JST)