Home market new car sales were the sole bright spot in July for Mexico’s car industry, which continues to slump amid economic weakness in the US, Dow Jones reported.
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Production in the world’s 11th biggest car making country dropped 17% in July, compared with July 2002, to 114,316 units, Mexican automobile association AMIA said in a press release cited by the news agency.
Mexico exports over 70% of the cars it makes, mainly to the US, where demand has been weak for many of the models made in the country – exports fell 10.3% during July to 92,779 units, Dow Jones said, though home market sales rose 4.8% to 83,343 vehicles, the third consecutive month of growth.
According to Dow Jones, Mexicans have purchased 544, 852 new cars in the first seven months of this year, down 2.3% from the same period in 2002, while year-to-date production was down 14% to 926,787 and exports were 9.5% lower at 706,082.
Among companies posting hefty production drops in the first seven months of the year are Ford and General Motors – Ford turned out 97,848 vehicles, down 63.7%, and GM dropped 32.9% to 273,833 units, the report said.
Meanwhile, Dow Jones added, Ford shipped 75,166 vehicles from Mexico, or 64.2% less than in the January-July period of 2002, while Nissan shipments abroad dropped 28.1% to 66,969 vehicles.
