Toyota Cutting Production

An understandable downsizing. But the company retains the capacity when demand returns and production can increase.

Toyota Cuts Production 28% to 7-Year Low as Auto Sales Plunge

May 13 (Bloomberg) -- Toyota Motor Corp., the world's biggest automaker, will slash global vehicle production by 28 percent in 2009 to the lowest in seven years as worldwide vehicle demand plummets.

Global output will fall to 6.68 million vehicles from 9.24 million in 2008, Hideaki Homma, a company spokesman, said today by phone. Sales will drop 18 percent to 7.34 million vehicles, he said. The figures include the carmaker's Daihatsu Motor Co. and Hino Motors Ltd. subsidiaries.

Toyota, which has enough capacity to build 10 million vehicles a year, has slashed production as rising unemployment and falling wages push U.S. auto sales to near 30-year lows.

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