Toyota also builds and plans to export Sienna minivans from TMMI.
Toyota will begin exporting U.S.-built Sienna minivans to distributors in South Korea this month. The Sienna is produced at Toyota’s non-union manufacturing plant in Princeton, Indiana. Initial sales projections are small, 600 units annually. Sienna exports will ultimately be helped by the implementation of the controversial Korean FTA or free trade agreement, which the Obama Administration pushed through Congress last month.
The Korea FTA is opposed by all organized labor groups, except the United Auto Workers Union, which in the view of critics sold out organized labor for the promise that 75,000 UAW-built vehicles would be exported to Korea. Thus far, Ford and General Motors, all with new four-year UAW contracts, have not announced plans to export to Korea, although it is expected they will. In a statement at the time the FTA passed Congress, Ford said it would help the sale of American-made Focuses, Tauruses, Mustangs, Escapes, and Explorers, among other cars and trucks.
Chrysler Group currently exports a small number of Chrysler, Jeep and Dodge vehicles to South Korea – now ~2,600 annually – and did so before the FTA. Chrysler anticipates expanding the exports under what it says is a more equitable trade agreement, but has not announced any actions.
President Obama has said that the Korean FTA would not have been possible without the help of the UAW. Critics say the FTA will cause the loss of more U.S. manufacturing jobs, under the “no jobs” Obama Administration. (See AutoInformed on: UAW Defends Korean FTA as Other Unions Protest Deal)
In a previous statement the UAW statement it said, “For the first time ever, the UAW was consulted and played a meaningful role in the negotiations and was able to successfully influence the process and secure significant improvements to the automotive provisions in the trade agreement.”
Korea is the fifth largest producer and fourth largest exporter of motor vehicles in the world, and up to now its car market has been closed to outsiders, even as U.S. taxpayers prop up its economy with massive amounts of defense spending more than 50 years after the Korean War or “police action” ended.
The U.S. Korean FTA – it’s said – will help redress this imbalance. The revised Korean Free Trade Agreement eliminates tariffs on more than 95% of industrial and consumer goods within five years, according to the White House. But it also protects the Korean beef and pharmaceutical industries.
This is the first time the Sienna minivan will be exported outside of North America. Year-to-date Toyota has sold more than 91,000 Sienna minivans in the U.S. Ford Motor and General Motors are no longer in the minivan business after they were driven out of the segment by better selling minivans from Toyota, and also the Honda Odyssey (more than 86,000 ytd). Chrysler – the inventor of the minivan – still has the largest share of the U.S. minivan market with its perennial strong selling Town & Country and Dodge Caravan models – sales of more than 171,000 ytd.
Toyota began exporting U.S.-built vehicles in 1988. Toyota exports which now total half the annual volume of a final assembly plant at ~100,000 units. With the start of these Sienna shipments to South Korea, Toyota will now export U.S.-assembled vehicles to 19 countries around the world. Other Toyota export vehicles include the Georgetown, KY-produced Avalon sedan, the Princeton, IN-produced Sequoia SUV and the San Antonio, TX-produced Tacoma and Tundra pick-up trucks.
GM because of it ownership of Daewoo already has a substantial position in Korea, unlike Ford, which refused to bail out an ailing Kia late in the last century. Chevrolet is being introduced in Korea in 2011 with locally made vehicles after GM Korea was formed in March from GM Daewoo Automotive and Technology (GMDAT).
GM Daewoo was formed from the extinct Daewoo Group, which went bankrupt in 1999. It has five manufacturing facilities in Korea, as well as an assembly facility in Vietnam. GM Daewoo also provides vehicle kits for assembly at GM facilities in China, Thailand, India, Colombia and Venezuela. GM Daewoo sells in Korea and exports almost two million units annually.
GM Daewoo has been one of the world’s fastest-growing vehicle producers over the past eight years. Between October 17, 2002, when the company was established, and the end of September 2010, it produced 11,129,597 units, including 5,342,908 complete vehicles and 5,786,689 complete knockdown (CKD) kits for assembly outside Korea.
See:
- President Obama and South Korean President Lee Defend Korean FTA at a Michigan General Motors Small Car Plant
- Obama Administration Submits Controversial FTAs to Congress. Largest Loss of Jobs since NAFTA Coming?
- EU-South Korea Free Trade Agreement Favors Koreans
- Ford of Europe CEO Stephen O’Dell Calls for a Comprehensive Industrial Policy and Rejection of Korean FTA
- Korean Automakers Post Huge U.S. Sales Gains as Disputed Free Trade Agreement Heads for Congressional Approval
- General Motors to Build New Chevrolet Malibu in Korea
- UAW Defends Korean FTA as Other Unions Protest Deal
- AFL-CIO Rejects Korean FTA. New Trade Policy Called For
- Korean Free Trade Agreement gets UAW, Ford Support
- Hyundai Strike! UAW to Demonstrate at Hyundai America
