Many enterprises said that to lower prices, they needed more locally-made spare parts, but the country's support industry was still weak. Photo giaoduc.net.vn

HA NOI (Biz Hub) — The struggling Viet Nam car making industry is already turning to importing vehicles well before the country joins the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) in 2018.

A report from the Vietnam Automobile Manufacturers' Association showed that its members sold 92,000 units in 2012, a fall of 33 per cent compared with 2011.

When the presently high taxes dropped to zero in 2018, cars from ASEAN countries are expected to flood into Viet Nam.

Toyota Motor Vietnam (TMV) will display Lexus cars from Japan at the Vietnam Motor Show to be held in HCM City next month. Honda Vietnam also plans to sell imported cars.

According to Honda Vietnam's sales manager, Tomohiro Maruto, after three months of launching the model, the company has received more than 1,600 orders but delivered only about 300 units. It has raised production capacity to 600 units a year, but this is still not enough. The company also plans to import the Accord model by the end of this year.

Misibishi, whose strong position in four-wheel-drive vehicles, will also display two small sedans for women motorists at the motor show in HCM City.

And Ford Vietnam has recently started to import the pick-up Ranger from Thailand.

According to the Customs Agency, more than 23,000 completely-built units have been imported to Viet Nam so far this year a 22.5 per cent increase compared with the same period last year. Of these, 11,100 were cars and 10,000 heavy vehicles.

Deputy Director of Vinastar, Kiyoshi Teshima, said Mitsubishi had been assembling cars and selling imported ones.

At present, most cars from ASEAN sold in Viet Nam come from Thailand and Indonesia. In the future, cars imported from South Korea, China and Japan are expected to increase strongly.

Although the three countries are not members of ASEAN, the regional group will reduce their import taxes to 5 per cent by 2018.

Many car makers in Viet Nam said that price cuts were necessary because the import tax on spare parts in Viet Nam was high while it does not exist in Thailand and Indonesia.

They said to lower prices, they needed more locally-made spare parts, but the country's support industry was still weak.

General Director of Toyota Motor Vietnam Yoshihisa Maruta said although the company had increased locally-made spare parts to 40 per cent, production costs were still higher than in Thailand and Indonesia.— VNS