MANILA, Philippines – Local auto assemblers are facing delays on their supplies of completely built-up vehicles and assembly parts from Japan as the impact of the tsunami have affected Japanese auto manufacturing plant operations as well as their supply chain.

Most Japanese car companies, however, are still conducting full assessment on the damage.

Among the Japanese car companies, Honda Motor Co. could be hurt more than others because more than 100 of its suppliers are based near the quake and tsunami damaged areas. It has extended resumption of operation to Wednesday, March 23.

Voltaire Gonzales, head of vehicle sales and corporate communications of Honda Cars Philippines Inc., said all of HCPI’s CBUs - CRV, Accord and Jazz are imported from Thailand but some assembly parts for its CKD models Civic and City are imported from Japan. HCPI is the country’s third biggest car assembler.

“We are now assessing the impact on local operation,” said Gonzales.

Toyota Motor, the world’s largest carmaker, could be the least hit by the disaster because most of its parts markets are located southwest of Tokyo, far from the disaster’s epicenter in the northeast.

Market reports said that Toyota Motor Corp., which builds the Prius hybrid and Lexus luxury cars in Japan, has shut its assembly plants there through at least today, March 22, at the cost of about 110,000 cars and trucks. The company originally said production could resume March 16.

Its local unit, Toyota Motor Philippines imports its SUV models directly from Japan Alphard, Hi-Ace, Land Cruiser, Lexus, Prado, Previa, Rav 4 and Prius.

TMP vice-president Rommel Gutierrez said these Japanese CBU imports from Japan account for 10 percent of its total sales. TMP is the Philippines biggest car player.

“We are still assessing the situation because even if we source parts from Thailand for our CKD assembly here, some tier 2 and 3 assembly parts are imported from Japan,” Gutierrez said.

TMP assembles Innova and Vios models at its Sta. Rosa plant. These models account for 50 percent of its total sales.

“So far, there is no disruption of our Innova and Vios production,” Gutierrez said.

The CBU models that TMP imports from Thailand include Yaris, Altis, Camry, Fortuner and Hi-Lux. The Avanza is imported from Indonesia.

Mitsubishi Motor Philippines Corp.(MMPC), the country’s second biggest player, said that Mitsubishi Motors Corp. is fortunate that it did not sustain any damage for its plant and engine facilities because its main plants in Aichi and Okayama prefectures are quite distant from the disaster-stricken areas. MMC has restarted operations using their existing stockpiles.

Froilan G. Dytianquin, MMPC vice-president, however, said that production operations in MMC are expected to suffer delays given that some of the suppliers are located near the disaster stricken areas. Most of these were airbag, tire, seat and brake related companies which are also supplying other Japanese auto manufacturers. Additionally, other vendors which were not directly hit by the catastrophe are also experiencing delays in production due to power outages.

Dytianquin said that if these affected suppliers of MMC could not recover very soon it may affect MMPC's supply of Japan sourced CBU units such as the Pajero and ASX models. Other CBU units are sourced from Thailand and with high ASEAN local parts content. These are Montero Sport, Strada pick ups and Lancer 1.6 models.