N. Korean automaker aims to return to peak production by 2012

By Kim Hyun
SEOUL, July 14 (Yonhap) -- North Korea's sole home-grown automaker seeks to
expand its annual production capacity to 10,000 units by 2012, a level not
reached since its peak in the 1970s, a pro-Pyongyang paper said Tuesday.
The Sungri Motor Complex, which started production in 1958, has gone downhill as
the country suffered economic downturns and severe famine in the decades
following the 1970s.
The Choson Sinbo, a Tokyo-based newspaper that relays Pyongyang's position to the
outside world, said the automaker is aspiring to return to its record production
capacity by 2012, the target year for the country to become a "strong, prosperous
and powerful nation."
"As production decreased from the 70s, the workforce of the motor company fell to
75 percent of the peak years," the paper said.
"During economic hardships in the late 90s, the company was close to not
breathing. But now, anyone active in production is talking about the 'promised
revival,'" it said.
The paper noted North Korean leader Kim Jong-il's trip in March to the complex,
located at the foot of Mt. Sungni in South Phyongan Province, during which he
stressed that the "modernization and scientification of the complex" is the most
important factor in increasing output.
Kim then "guaranteed" state support to introduce computer numerical control
machines to the complex, it said.
The automaker started producing hundreds of trucks named "Sungri 58-type,"
"Sungri 61-type" or "Jaju (independence) 64-type" in late April, but output is
"still in their early stage," the paper said.
North Korea seeks to build a "strong, prosperous and powerful nation" by 2012,
the centenary of the birth year of Kim Il-sung, the nation's founder and father
of North Korea's current leader, Kim Jong-il, who will turn 70 that year.
hkim@yna.co.kr
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