Mitsubishi rethinks AUV hub plan for RP

Mitsubishi Motor Philippines Corp. (MMPC) is rethinking its earlier plan of making the Philippines its ASEAN hub for the production of Asian utility vehicles (AUVs).

This was disclosed yesterday by Melchor Dizon, MMPC senior vice president, during the formal launch of Mitsubishi’s 2003 Lancer passenger car.

Dizon said the government must provide more export incentives for local motor vehicle manufacturers to encourage them to make the Philippines an export hub.

Local car manufacturers are asking for tax credits on their vehicle exports to be applied against their excise tax on domestic vehicle sales.

Dizon said the current Motor Vehicle Development Program (MVDP) does not provide export incentives despite earlier announcement from the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) that it is studying such a possibility.

Dizon further said MMPC has decided to rethink its earlier plan because the design of its current AUV is only geared for the Philippine, Indonesia and Thai markets.

MMPC’s current AUV design, Dizon admitted, "is not that flexible to export."

Dizon said China is not likely to be an export market for ASEAN-manufactured motor vehicles because China is a big enough market to support its own motor vehicle manufacturing industry.

MMPC formally launched its 2003 Lancer model which is imported completely built-up (CBU) from Thailand under the ASEAN Free Trade Area-Common Effective Preferential Tariff (AFTA-CEPT) scheme.

According to Dizon, while the new Lancer 2003 model is a CBU import from Thailand, additional exterior and interior finish are added here.

MMPC no longer manufacturers passenger cars in the Philippines. What the company does here is assemble the Adventure AUV, the L200 and L300 vans as well as the Strada model. – Marianne Go