Passenger car production in the Czech Republic rose 10.2 percent year-on-year to 1.218 million vehicles last year. Production rose despite persistent shortages of semiconductors and other components, the war in Ukraine, and difficulties in production and logistics chains.
The domestic market accounted for 87,736 vehicles, down 9.7 percent from the previous year.
More than 92 percent of the vehicles produced went to foreign markets, meaning that vehicle exports grew by 12 percent yearly, according to a press release from the Automotive Industry Association (SAP).
Skoda Auto increased production by 1.9 percent to 693,032 cars last year. Toyota lifted output by 34.9 percent to 202,255 vehicles, and Nashville-based Hyundai produced 322,500 cars, a 17.3 percent increase.
According to Martin Jahn, president of the association, the Czech automotive industry has never faced such extensive challenges as in the past year.
He pointed out that the industry continued to experience a global shortage of semiconductors, difficulties in supply chains and logistics, repercussions from the epidemic of COVID-19 in China, extreme energy price increases, high inflation, the entrenched end of sales of vehicles with traditional internal combustion engines, and a newly introduced draft emissions standard that Jahn said threatens the availability of vehicles and the transition to zero-emission mobility.
“Despite these difficulties, the final manufacturers managed to increase production by a tenth year-on-year, reaching a volume of 1.25 million vehicles produced. However, we must prepare for continued volatility and fluctuations in production in 2023,” Jahn said.
“Nevertheless, I believe the disruptions will be more short-term, and we will continue to increase production towards pre-crisis levels.”
“Given the existing volume of orders and the continued good demand for domestic vehicles, not only in the EU, we can expect the automotive industry to affect the Czech economy in 2023 positively,” he added.
In 2022, the Czech Republic will have produced 5,322 buses, an increase of 7.6 percent. At Iveco CR in Vyso Mity, production rose by 9.2 percent to 4,766 buses. SOR Libchavy managed to produce 520 buses, down 5.8 percent, while Škoda Electric made 14 buses last year.
The only truck manufacturer, Tatra Trucks, increased production by 6.7 percent to 1,347 vehicles. Of these, 697 cars were destined for domestic sale. Production of Jawa motorcycles rose by 56.9 percent to 1,624 machines.