On the way to 5 million cars/year
Gazeta Mercantil - 03/11/2008
Brazil will have, already next year, installed capacity to produce 4 million vehicles. In order to produce this amount, the makers are planning the record investment of US$ 4.9 billion until the end of 2008. But the progress goes on. A survey by Anfavea (National Association of Automobile Manufacturers) reveals that the auto parts sector and the makers plan on investing US$ 20 billion up to 2010, which will take Brazil to a capacity of up to 5 million units a year. "So far, the companies have been able to respond to the growth of the market based on adjustments, elimination of bottlenecks, and increase of the working hours", affirmed Anfavea's president, Jackson Schneider, yesterday. "From now on, the investments will have to be intensified in order to keep-up with the rhythm of sales increase." In the monthly balance Anfavea presented the press, it was verified the frenetic increase of sales and production among all its members - makers of cars, commercial light vehicles, trucks, buses, and agricultural machines. Compared to the first two months of 2007, the same period of this year presented an increase of 38.7% vehicles (except for agricultural machines) licensed. The machines grew 62.6% in the first two months of the year: 6.8 thousand units were sold between January and February compared to 4.2 thousand in the same period of 2007. With the improvement of productive processes, the automobile industry managed to produce nearly 500 thousand vehicles more without making major investments. Between March, 2007, and February, 2008, 3.07 million vehicles were produced in comparison with 2.62 million units produced between March, 2006, and February, 2007. Nevertheless, the formula is already giving signs of exhaustion. And for this reason a record investment of nearly US$ 5 billion is planned for this year, which will take the Brazilian production to nearly 4 million units in 2009. Still in 2008, Anfavea projects a production capacity of 3.85 million vehicles, a mark that will make Brazil a respected international producer, which attracts more investments.