Japanese Honda plans to start assembly of its cars in Russia

TOKYO, September 18 (Itar-Tass) - The Japanese Honda Company intends
to start assembling its cars in Russia. The leading Japanese business
newspaper Nikkei reported on Sunday that this second largest Japanese car
company already submitted a plan to the Russian side and started talks.
The newspaper writes that the company plans to open an assembly line
in Russia for one of its models. It is supposed to put out annually
30,000-50,000 cars annually at the first stage; Japanese investments in
the project will total several billion yen (Eds: one billion yen tops 13
million US dollars at the current exchange rate).
An area for building the first Honda factory in Russia has not been
fixed yet; it is planned to find a place for it somewhere in the Primorye
Territory.
Until now, Honda imported its cars to Russia from Japan, the US and
Europe. However, its competitors Toyota and Nissan already started the
output of cars in Russia. Mazda will join them in 2012. Nikkei stresses
that "the Russian auto market has already overcome aftermaths of the
global financial crisis, showing a considerable growth last year; taking
into account this circumstance, this is very promising for the Japanese
car industry".