Japan is scrambling to respond to intensifying trade pressure from US President Donald Trump, with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe planning to meet the head of Toyota Motor Corp this week and business lobby Keidanren setting up a Trump task force.
Abe is to visit Washington on Feb. 10 for talks with Trump at which the US leader is expected to seek quick progress toward a two-way trade deal with Japan and discuss the automotive sector.
Ahead of those talks, Abe is to meet with Toyota chief executive Akio Toyoda, two sources said. One of them said the meeting would take place on Friday.
In a phone call with Abe on Saturday, Trump reiterated his pledge to create jobs in the US and asked that the Japanese auto industry contribute, the Nikkei business daily reported, quoting unidentified Japanese government officials.
The two leaders discussed the automotive industry, senior government spokesman Koichi Hagiuda told reporters after the phone call, without giving details. A White House statement said the two “committed to deepen the bilateral trade and investment relationship.”
Trump, who last week dropped out of the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership pushed by former US president Barack Obama and favored by Abe, has repeatedly attacked Japan’s auto market as closed in an echo of criticism heard two decades ago.
Japan has rejected that criticism, saying it does not impose tariffs on US auto imports nor put up discriminatory non-tariff barriers.
Over the decades, Japanese automakers have developed SUVs, minivans and pickup trucks specifically targeting US consumers’ taste for bigger cars, while US brands have struggled to make inroads in Japan, where drivers overwhelmingly prefer domestic brands.
Foreign-branded cars accounted for only 7 percent of the passenger car market, led by Germany. US brands collectively made up less than a third of 1 percent of passenger cars sold in Japan last year.
Toyota reported yesterday that it sold 10.175 million vehicles worldwide last year, fewer than Volkswagen AG’s 10.31 million.
Toyota’s global sales last year were slightly better than in 2015, up 0.2 percent, but not good enough to beat Volkswagen, which has the Audi, Porsche and Skoda brands, and boosted its global sales 3.8 percent from the year before.
Toyota has come under fire from Trump for plans, announced in 2015, to shift production of its Corolla to Mexico from Canada. Earlier this month, Japan’s top automaker said it would invest US$10 billion in the US over the next five years, the same as the previous five years.
Toyota says it directly employed about 40,000 US workers as of December 2015 and indirectly more than 200,000 if dealers and suppliers are included.
Japan’s biggest business lobby, Keidanren, wants to beef up its information gathering and analysis of the Trump administration’s policies while also conveying data on Japan Inc’s importance to the US economy, a Keidanren official said.
“We will create a task force the main purpose of which is to convey correct information about the contribution of Japanese firms in the United States,” said another Keidanren official, who declined to be identified because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
Tokyo came under harsh US criticism in the late 1980s and early 1990s, when Japan accounted for up to 60 percent of the US trade deficit.
However, now its share has shrunk to less than 10 percent, while China’s has ballooned to nearly 50 percent — something Japanese officials are trying to stress to US counterparts.
Automobiles and car parts account for about three-quarters of the overall Japan-US trade gap, making it an easy target.
Additional reporting by AP
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