Honda Motor Co.’s China sales are poised to fall as much as 50 percent this month with three of the company’s assembly plants in the central China city of Wuhan, the epicenter of the coronavirus epidemic, still closed.
Automakers and other industrial companies are not allowed to resume production until March 11 to prevent the transmission of the virus, the Wuhan government said last week.
In Wuhan, the three factories Honda runs with Dongfeng Motor Group can produce 650,000 vehicles a year at full capacity.
In the south China city of Guangzhou, Honda operates two plants with GAC Motor Co., which build up to 600,000 vehicles annually.
Honda’s January sales rose 9.8 percent to approach 150,000 despite the week-long Chinese New Year holiday that started January 23.
Two of Honda’s three most-popular models, the Civic and CR-V, are assembled at plants in Wuhan, while the Accord is produced at factories in Guangzhou.
The three vehicles each generated sales of 20,000 last month, according to Honda’s China office.
Nissan Motor Co.’s local deliveries dropped 12 percent to 118,143 last month. Toyota Motor Corp. disclose local sales tally for the month.
In January, overall new light-vehicle sales fell 20 percent to 1.61 million.
To prevent the coronavirus from spreading, Wuhan has been under lockdown since January 23.