2.5-million milestone for Toyota
45 years from the start, Toyota has built locally manufactured car number 2,500,000AMI began building Toyotas back in 1963. At the time, the company was also assembling Ramblers and Triumphs. The Australian motor industry was a very different place in those days and taxation favoured the brave assembler.
Following the recent production of a Toyota Camry Grande finished in white, Toyota has now surpassed the 2.5-million-unit tally of vehicles built in Australia.
According to Toyota, 650,000 of the vehicles built in Australia over the years have been exported. Chances are that the proportion of exports will increase as local manufacturers start to look further abroad for sales growth.
The achievement has come perhaps a little sooner than expected, with Toyota's Altona plant building almost 150,000 cars last year -- a 35,000-unit improvement on the plant's previous record, set in 2003.
Local production has increased exponentially over the years. Toyota didn't complete local production of the first million cars until 1992, almost 30 years after local production commenced. It took just 12 years for the company to manufacture the second million units.
Currently, the company is building four-cylinder Camry and V6 Aurion at the Altona plant, in Melbourne's western suburbs. The plant was opened in 1994. Prior to that, the company built cars in plants at Port Melbourne and Dandenong.
To comment on this article click here
Please see our Editorial Guidelines & Code of Ethics (including for more information about sponsored content and paid events). The information published on this website is of a general nature only and doesn’t consider your particular circumstances or needs.
