World No 1 car market: China

A TV personality came to our office and interviewed us the other day. We were asked for some comments on car exports from Japan to China. We told them that there is huge demand in China and considering the needs in the market over there, we have many enquiries regarding exporting left-hand drive cars from Japan; but because of the import ban on the Chinese side, we cannot do so. Although on the actual programme, they cut bits & pieces, they conveyed what we wanted to say; so I guess it went OK.

Speaking about China, since last year’s subprime mortgage crises, even the Chinese economy has been greatly hit. However, they are recovering from it incredibly fast, a lot faster than other countries in the world. According to the latest report, the number of new cars sold in China in the first half of the year 2009 (between January and June) was a 17.7% increase from the previous year to 6.1 million vehicles and it was the world No 1 easily beating the USA (4.81 million vehicles).

The Chinese government announced car sales promotion policies such as big cuts in automobile acquisition tax for compact cars and handing out subsidies for rural people’s car purchases. As a result, private passenger cars especially compact ones have sold well at an increase of 25.6% compared to the sales of the year before.

In China, not many people use car loans unlike Europe and the USA. 90% buy them in cash. This could be the reason why the financial crises had minimum impact on their economy. In the USA etc., finance companies tightened their criteria for loans, which caused the chill in the market but in China they used cash so the effect only hit their psychology. The property and share prices and individual consumption in the country are all heading upward and the car dealers remain confident for sales in the second half of the year.

Toyota, struggling in sales in Japan, started offshore production of their sport SUV “RAV4” with their merged company in China. They are thinking about widening their car lines. Nissan Motors increased their sales in China by 18.9% to 540,000 cars, which is 1/7 of their world expected sales in 2008; and now they are increasing the line-ups of compact car ranges to increase their sales volume to 800,000 by the year 2012.

All Japanese car manufacturers are in slump now in the domestic market and are now looking at the Chinese market. Even in China, cars are not cheap. As in Japan, they cost 1-2 million yen each. It will be a few years income for the average Chinese person. They usually buy cars which are like 5 years income but to me it seems too much compared to their income and car prices. I guess there is status in owning a car in China and cars are selling well. Wait a minute: isn’t it amazing that people have a saving of 5 years income? We cannot underestimate their power, can we?


★ Japanese used car stock : http://jpctrade.com/stock/index.html
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(Editor)
JPC TRADE CO.,LTD.
3B YS-Building, 1-2-2 Botan, Koto-ku, Tokyo, Japan
Japan Used Motor Vehicle Exporters Association (JUMVEA)
TEL : +81-3-5245-7731
FAX : +81-3-3643-4955

Car Sick

My wife drove us to our eldest daughter’s school Cultural Festival last Sunday. I like reading, so as usual I was reading a book while she drove the car. Although I was absorbed in reading, I felt sick without a warning. Yes, I was car sick. Searching my memory, I had never been car sick before. It could be because I had not had a decent sleep for a while. Anyway, I started feeling really rotten. Because I had not had it before, it is not easy to describe the condition, but I had a wicked headache and felt nauseous. It could be because of my wife’s bad driving or my reading in the car (of course she was blaming the latter) I just wanted to get out of the car as soon as possible. Luckily it only took 5 more minutes before we got to the school, by taking a bit of a break, I felt better and it did not affect me for the rest of the day. However, it was embarrassing I, who deal cars everyday, got car sick. Anyway, I could not leave it behind and checked about the condition.

According to a health magazine, in Japan, there are more cases of people between 40 and 50 years old as well as late teens getting car sick. The reasons are unknown but it said that stress might be playing a great part.

It said that no one knows why we get car sick in the first place but recent studies are showing it happens through three different stages.

Firstly, there happens a gap between the positional information our brain gets from our eyes and the information about speed and gradient we feel in the inner ears, etc. Our brain checks the gap by comparing it with any previous information, and decides it is anxiety and discomfort if we have never had it before. Then as a result, it provokes secretion of stress hormones and unusual levels of adrenaline. Finally this causes an imbalance of our auto immune system, cold sweat, short term fluctuation of blood pressure, excess saliva & slight yawns and eventually it makes us feel like throwing up.

The reason this happens more often for primary to junior high school age is that their brain takes this unexperienced body reaction as an “abnormality” and decides it is discomfort at the second stage. As we get older, we have more experience and get used to different movements, so the gap is most often cancelled and we do not get sick.

Also they found that middle to senior people with depression or early stage Meniere's disease get car sick. People with depression feel this uncomfortable situation caused by the gap in the information in their brain in the same way as when they feel stress. People with Meniere’s disease have different levels of function between their left and right ears and this also increase the level of anxiety and stress.

In my case, thanks to annual health check-ups, I do not have depression or Meniere’s disease but this time, I will listen to my wife’s earful lecture and stop reading in a car.



★ Japanese used car stock : http://jpctrade.com/stock/index.html
★ JPCTRADE Home page : http://jpctrade.com/
★ JPCTRADE Blog : http://jpctrade.blogspot.com/

(Editor)
JPC TRADE CO.,LTD.
3B YS-Building, 1-2-2 Botan, Koto-ku, Tokyo, Japan
Japan Used Motor Vehicle Exporters Association (JUMVEA)
TEL : +81-3-5245-7731
FAX : +81-3-3643-4955