Suzuki Motor Corp has halted production of its flagship Swift compact hatchback due to China's export restrictions on rare-earth elements, sources close to the matter said, marking the first suspension by a Japanese automaker tied to the curbs.
The restrictions have caused delays in procuring parts that use rare earths, the sources said.
The Chinese government in April imposed export controls on seven types of rare-earth minerals as part of its retaliation against U.S. tariffs. The move has already begun to disrupt production in the United States and Europe.
Suzuki suspended production of the Swift, excluding the Sport model, at its Sagara plant in Shizuoka Prefecture, on May 26.
While it announced that it would partially resume production from June 13 and fully resume from June 16, it did not disclose the reason for the halt.
© KYODO
9 Comments
Login to comment
P_C
global economy starting to reel from china's absolute ability to curb critical production. discount, disrespect china no more western oligarchs. xi is a master long haul "chess player".
HopeSpringsEternal
China won't have their rare earth monopoly for long, and meanwhile they're just further destroying their goodwill, because nobody's forgotten Covid!
HopeSpringsEternal
Economists using serious data know actual Chinese economy about 40% smaller, 'deflated', than official GDP numbers, and thus China's becoming desperate as deflation rages, property prices fall, and demographic collapse worsens, hence their rare earth '$terrorism'
garymalmgren
RE:China won't have their rare earth monopoly for long,
Not sure about that.
Rare earths are not rare, however extracting and refining them is an extremely dirty process.
Rare earths were mined and refined in the US up until fairly recently.
The reason that it ceased is the prohibitively high costs of controlling the devastating environmental impacts.
Many countries (Australia, Canada, Russia, Czech Republic) have the resources but are not prepared to pay the economic or environmental cost of extracting and processing rare earths
So, China DOES NOT have a monopoly. What it has is the system that allows them to skirt ALL of the safeguards thereby producing processed rare earths at an unbeatable price.
The west could theoretically process their own rare earths, but the hurdles are very high and therefore expensive.
Now,on the other hand, if the Whitehouse sees this as a National Security issue a large maker pen could see it done in a day. Or maybe not.
Ercan Arisoy
Why Peking's export restrictions about REEs include everyone rather than targeting Us manufacturers exclusively?
JeffLee
Story is badly edited, seemingly by some one who doesn't understand the story.
The lead should be: "Suzuki Motor Corp halted production of its flagship Swift compact hatchback in late May due to China's export restrictions on rare-earth elements, sources close to the matter said, marking the first suspension by a Japanese automaker tied to the curbs."
ian
Any particular reason why china should just target the US exclusively?
OKuniyoshi
People seem to forget, or, conveniently forget. Its a game they can play/use too. When you complied/listened to your master about banning materials in the semi conductor industry to them? One example. Allowed yourself to be used, pawn, for their strategic battles, well everything is on the table. They have the human capital to overcome bottlenecks, can you? So, perhaps, its time to wake up.
Peter Neil
I said China would do this soon after Trump’s made-for-TV White House garden tariff party. It will affect other carmakers, aviation and other industries more as in-stock amounts are used up.
It was soundly downvoted, of course.