KARACHI, Dec 24: The first quarter of 2009 may prove to be challenging for the auto parts makers, who have received very low orders for parts and accessories from the local car assemblers.

Vendors said that they had received fewer orders of car parts from the local assemblers for January to March period next year. They hoped that the assemblers might enhance their orders later as the figures provided by them show increase in production from April to June, 2009.

They said that Pak Suzuki Motor Company had planned to produce only 500 units of Mehran in January followed by 700 units in February and 800 in March. The company plans to make 1,265 units of Mehran in April, 875 in May and 1,270 in June. The November ‘08 has already witnessed the lowest production of 517 units of Mehran.

Similarly, in January the Pak Suzuki will roll out 200 units of Alto, 500 in February, 600 in March, 710 in April, 500 in May and 705 in June. The November ‘08 recorded the lowest production figure of 306 units of Alto.

Around 400 Cultus cars have been planned in January followed by 500 in February, 600 in March, 945 in April, 655 in May and 960 in June. In November only 616 units of Cultus were produced.

Suzuki Liana’s production in January has been reduced to 100 units each from January to March and it is projected to rise at 115 units in April and May and 105 units in June. In November only 14 units were assembled.

The vendors said that the production schedule of new Toyota Corolla had not been hit much as compared to Suzuki’s production plans. The Indus Motors launched the new Corolla recently and the company will assemble 2,970 units in January, 2,530 units in February and 2,560 units in March.

On the contrary, the company is planning to make 2,180 units in April, 1,890 units in May and 1,770 units in June. In November this year the company had already rolled out 3,053 units.

In January 2009, 260 units of Cuore are projected to be assembled and 330 units in February. Around 460 units will be produced from March to May, while June may witness production of 450 units. Cuore’s production in November was just 530 units.

The vendors said that in good times when leasing used to have 70-80 per cent share in total sales of cars, Suzuki Mehran had seen a peak production of over 3,000 units in a single month. The highest production recorded by Alto and Cultus were over 2,000 units and over 2,700 units, respectively. Toyota Corolla and Cuore had enjoyed highest production of over 3,000 and over 1,200 per month, respectively. Now the car leasing and financing had shrunk to five per cent hardly owing to surging car financing rates and the State Bank warning to banks to be cautious of rising default.

The vendors feel that perhaps the local car makers have given these figures keeping in view of looming uncertainties caused by war-like-situation with India. They said that many buyers had virtually put-on-hold their plans of buying new cars.

Meanwhile, sources in car industry said that Pak Suzuki was planning to shut down its second shift from January.According to figures of Pakistan Automotive Manufacturers Association (PAMA), the overall car sales (Toyota Corolla, Cuore, Honda City, Honda Civic, Suzuki Mehran, Alto, Liana, Cultus and Hyundai Santro) in July-November 2008 fell by 46 per cent to 33,853 units from 62,815 units in the same period of 2007. There were no production figures of Hyundai Santro for October and November.

An analyst at JS Research attributed the declining sales to political and economic instability, increase in car prices and high rates of car financing.

The vendors said that as many as 50,000 workers and staffers had already lost their jobs from July till now in the local vending industry owing to falling demand of cars. Even some manufacturers like Pak Suzuki and Dewan Motors have also cut jobs. They fear more job cuts in the first quarter in view of the persistent fall in car demand.