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The assembly line rolls again, tenuous at Honda in Japan.
Honda Motor Workers met one of the last company vehicles on the assembly line at the Sayama factory in Saitama prefecture Credit Moshe Komata for the New York Times.
SAYAMA, Japan as a sign of electric vehicles counted ride on the Honda assembly line here, a scrolling message exhorted employees Let's pool our strength to overcome this crisis.
A little over a month after the earthquake and tsunami devastated the supply chain of the automotive industry in Japan, Honda as other major Japanese automakers resumed domestic production.
The factory Honda here in Sayama, a suburb of Tokyo, was not damaged by disasters Neither was his other big factory, about 200 miles southwest of here, but car production in Japan is only half of the normal level for Honda to Honda's biggest rivals, Toyota and Nissan.
This is mainly because many of the 20 000 to 30 000 pieces that go into a Japanese car come from the region affected by the earthquake in northern Japan, where many suppliers have been thrown Online least parts manufacturers can resume production quickly, automakers may have to close down again.
We can not continue for long, said Ko Katayama, general manager at Honda's plant here, refusing to specify the duration of the production could continue Sooner or later he's going to miss.
Honda is now only 400 to 450 vehicles per day at the factory in Sayama That's down from the daily rate of 800 to 900 before the earthquake, said Atsushi Nemoto, a spokesman for the company.
Production deficits for the largest automakers in Japan crush income was just beginning to recover from the global crisis caused by the global financial crisis In the long term, the Japanese industry could lose global market share over the past years, it was almost 30 percent customers overseas échantillonnent other brands.
Analysts say Japanese automakers might also resign themselves to do more of their products offshore Even before the disaster in March, the three Japanese automakers were producing most of their vehicles outside the country For Honda only about 27 percent of its 3 6 million cars last year were made in Japan.
Of course, if the vital parts are unavailable, some factories outside Japan are also affected, but not to the same extent as those of Japan Honda, for example, said it will produce at a reduced rate in North America least until May 6
Noriyuki Matsushima, an auto analyst at Citigroup, estimates that global production by Japanese automakers will decrease by 15 percent during the year ending next March, he predicted full Japanese auto production would not resume before October.
In a worst case scenario, he wrote in a recent report, would be the largest ever industry operating losses in the first half of the year, surpassing even those posted at the time of the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers.
The limited scope of the recovery at the Honda factory here, known as the plant in Saitama, was evident Monday the company told reporters invited to observe the operations had resumed a week ago, but access was limited to one place at the end of the assembly line, where workers jackets of white society and pants finalize minivans Elysion, a model sold only in Japan.
An official Honda recognized that if journalists had seen the whole plant, they would have seen sections of the assembly line containing no cars.
Toyota, too, who had resumed production at all 17 of its domestic factories as Monday, working only half the volume, said Shiori Hashimoto, spokesman It plans to close factories again from April 28 May 9 for an extended version of Japan's Golden Week period containing several holidays and even after production resumes at half volume, Ms. Hashimoto said, the situation is uncertain after June 3
Honda has moved workers from a damaged plant in a satellite office at its factory in Sayama credit Moshe Komata for the New York Times.
In the last week Nissan also resumed production at all five of its auto plants and two engine plants in Japan, including the plant in Iwaki engine that was heavily damaged by the earthquake, but Nissan, too, produces about half as many vehicles as usual, Mitsuru Yonekawa, a spokesman said.
Koji Endo, managing director at Advanced Research Japan, a research firm on shares, said automakers could have 1 June crisis when stocks of crucial pieces short There is a very good chance they will have to close again at -he says.
The crisis has made automakers realize how vulnerable their supply systems While they have close relationships with direct suppliers, they might not know all the companies that supply parts for suppliers or even smaller further back in the chain.
A major concern is a supplier called Renesas Electronics It holds a 40 percent share in the world and even more in Japan market almost every system control automotive microcontrollers computers on chips in a car, like riding a diet or window mounted engine.
Renesas, whose semiconductor factory Hitachinaka was heavily damaged by the earthquake, said he hopes to resume production in July, and perhaps earlier it could take several weeks to reach significant production levels, according to analysts, if the shortage might last August.
It is difficult for auto companies to change microcontroller supplier, since the chips are customized to some extent.
Other vendors may remain closed even longer because they are in the evacuation zone around the Fukushima Daiichi including a rubber component manufacturer, Fujikura Rubber, and Namie Japan Brake, making skates disc brakes.
Honda officials say their priority is to help suppliers recover online, not to seek new M. Nemoto, spokesman paraphrased remarks made earlier by the company president, Takanobu Ito, that abandonment of existing suppliers would effectively kill.
Automakers and parts suppliers, for example, sent hundreds of people to the Renesas factory crippled to help restore water and natural gas and repair equipment.
Honda also shows a certain loyalty to the 5,000 workers at the factory in Saitama, they continue to work full time with full pay, despite the limited production.
The factory still works the usual two shifts of eight hours per day, but only four hours of each shift are devoted to real output remaining four hours are occupied by busywork as storage.
The plant in Saitama, which opened in 1964, had already suffered a sharp decline in production and exports dried up in the financial crisis only 344,000 vehicles were produced here in 2009, down from 556,000 in 2007 and quelques- each vehicle once exported to the States of the plant states, like the CR-V, Odyssey and some Acura and Accord models, are now manufactured primarily in North America.
Saitama also has the handicap of being served by the Tokyo Electric Power Company, owner of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant and may have lost up to 20 percent of the overall production capacity of the company because of its various plants affected by the natural disaster.
Because of this, Saitama could face severe restrictions on electricity use this summer so Honda is planning to transfer production to its other big Japanese factory, its Suzuka factory, which is near Nagoya and serviced by a company of different electricity.
If this happens, employees here in Saitama have less work to do.
The most painful thing for a plant, said M. Katayama, the plant manager Saitama, is unable to make.
A version of this article appears in print April 19, 2011, on page B1 of the New York edition with the headline The assembly line rolls Again, tenuous at Honda in Japan today Subscribe order paper reprints .
Honda in Japan Resumes Production Cars tenuous The New York Times, Honda, Japan resumes.