The production of light vehicles by Iran Khodro Company (IKCO) and SAIPA Automotive Group has increased by 236% from the beginning of the current fiscal year (March 21), until June 8, compared with the same period of last year, according to the spokesman of the Ministry of Industries, Mining and Trade.
“During the period under review, the number of incomplete vehicles produced by IKCO and SAIPA declined by 69%,” Omid Qalibaf was also quoted as saying by the news portal of Car.ir.
The spokesman noted that 160,680 light vehicles have been produced by these two companies, of which 121,482 vehicles were complete and 39,198 vehicles were incomplete.
“During this period, the deferred liabilities of Iran Khodro and SAIPA have decreased by 70%, which amounted to 17,661 from March 21 to June 8,” he added.
Earlier, the International Organization of Motor Vehicle Manufacturers released statistics showing that the world’s total car production increased by 3% year-on-year to 80.145 million in 2021.
The organization, founded in 1919 in Paris, is an international trade association whose members include 39 national automotive trade associations.
Domestic car production also increased by 2% and reached 894,000 units in 2021.
According to the organization’s latest report, Iran is ranked 19th among the world's largest automakers.
Iran is placed after Britain, which produced 932,000 vehicles in 2021. It was followed by countries such as Italy with 795,000 units, South Africa with 499,000 units, Poland with 439,000 units, Portugal with 289,000 units, Taiwan with 265,000 units, Belgium with 261,000 units, Austria with 136,000 units, Finland with 93,000 units and Egypt with 23,000 units.
China topped the list as the world's largest automaker with 26.82 million units and was followed by the United States with 9.16 million cars.
Japan with 7.85 million units, India with 4.4 million units, South Korea with 3.46 million units, Germany with 3.31 million units, Mexico with 3.15 million units, Brazil with 2.25 million units, Spain with 2.98 million units and Thailand with 1.69 million units, respectively, were placed third to 10th in the ranking of the world's largest automakers.
SAIPA Sets Production Records
The daily and weekly domestic production records were broken by SAIPA Automotive Group in the third fiscal month (started May 22), according to the latest statistics reported by the company.
With the output of 1,835 vehicles on May 25, SAIPA set the daily production record in the last eight months.
In the first week of the current Iranian month (May 22-28), with the production of 10,601 vehicles, the highest weekly output was registered in the last 12 months by the industrial group, Donyaye Khodro reported.
To increase production capacity and reduce unfinished vehicles, SAIPA completed 17,000 vehicles since March 21, which resulted in a 40% reduction in unfinished vehicles.
In other words, the 43,000 incomplete vehicles in the company’s parking lot have decreased to 26,000 and the company claims that the number of these vehicles will soon reach 20,000 vehicles.
Concerning the total production of SAIPA in the fiscal 2021-22, nearly 70,000 vehicles were produced which, according to the automotive plan of the Industries Ministry, shows that 103% of its target were achieved.
Despite the criticisms of some automakers regarding the ministry’s policy regarding the integrated sales system, Mohammad Ali Teymouri, the CEO of SAIPA, considered it as one of the best implemented in the automotive industry.
"All major automobile producing countries in the world sell their products on this basis. If proper policymaking had been done for SAIPA from the beginning, the group would have been able to produce 2,700 vehicles in three shifts," he added.
Teymouri noted that SAIPA has been able to use 98% of its capacity in two shifts this year and produce 1,800 cars per day.
“The main problem with unsafe cars goes back to the 18 million cars produced in the fiscal 2011-12 and before," he said.
"Recently, Tiba and Samand cars have been introduced as unsafe cars by the Institute of Standards and Industrial Research of Iran. However, these vehicles have 85 standards and the main problem is in the cars produced before the fiscal 2011-12 and a fundamental decision must be made to collect old cars," he said.
"There must be a process to remove the car from the production chain because currently, parts manufacturers have produced parts for Tiba and Samand, the manufacturers of which also have parts of these two cars in their warehouses. So, preventing the production of these cars in a sudden manner and without prior notice will cause losses and waste national resources."
