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Venezuela Car Market Shrank Below 300 Units in March
Monthly vehicle sales in Venezuela, which peaked at 52,700 units in mid-2007, plummeted to fewer than 300 cars, trucks and buses last month, says industry group Camara Automotriz de Venezuela.
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Monthly vehicle sales in Venezuela, which peaked at 52,700 units in mid-2007, plummeted to fewer than 300 cars, trucks and buses last month, says industry group Camara Automotriz de Venezuela.
Monthly sales had fallen to around 10,000 units between 2010 and 2013. But volumes slid to less than half that pace in 2014. They have been dropping since then as the country sinks into a political and economic crisis. Last year the entire Venezuelan auto industry produced only 2,800 cars.
Bloomberg News notes that the country’s chronic shortage of American dollars has crippled assembly plants and dried up supplies of repair parts. Now, the news service says, even scrapyard are running out of used components.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Dept. of State says it is looking into Venezuela’s seizure on Tuesday of General Motors Co.’s assembly plant in Valencia. Reuters says local media reports blame the incident on a 17-year-old civil dispute with a supplier and not a move to nationalize the facility.
The State Dept. says it hopes to resolve the issue “rapidly and transparently.”
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