Honda’s China venture ships first cars abroad as country’s auto industry pursues status as world’s largest exporter
- Dongfeng Honda Automobile said its first export shipment of plug-in hybrid and battery-powered EVs is en route from Shanghai to Belgium
- The cars will be sold in several European countries in the latest example of China’s rising power in the global car industry
Dongfeng Honda Automobile, a 50-50 joint venture between the Japanese company and its Chinese partner Dongfeng Motor Group, said on Tuesday that hundreds of CR-V hybrids and pure electric e:NS1s had begun their voyage from Shanghai to Zeebrugge, Belgium, on May 15.
The cars are expected to reach the Belgian port in late June before being delivered to European countries including the UK, Iceland, Greece and Portugal.
It is the first time that the venture, based in Wuhan, capital of central China’s Hubei province, has exported Chinese-made cars amid Beijing’s ambitions of building itself into a global powerhouse in EV manufacturing.
“Dongfeng Honda will take advantage of opportunities abroad to bolster overseas shipments,” the company said in a statement on its official WeChat account. “Chinese quality will dazzle the world.”
Zheng Chunkai, executive vice general manager of Dongfeng Motor, told the Post that the carmaker will achieve a large volume of exports to Europe this year because of strong demand for EVs.
“Export volume will increase in accordance with rising demand for electric cars in Europe,” he said. “We will focus on Europe this year and ship more cars to the continent to meet consumers’ demand.”
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Among the first batch of exports, 300 units are CR-V hybrids, the company said. It did not reveal the total number of cars exported.
“Export of Honda’s Chinese-made cars adds to evidence that China’s EV makers are playing a leading role in the electrification drive of the industry,” said Eric Han, a senior manager at Suolei, an advisory firm in Shanghai. “China is likely to become the world’s largest car exporter this year, buoyed by rising deliveries in overseas markets from companies like Dongfeng Honda.”
The country’s sales of pure-electric and hybrid cars accounted for about 60 per cent of the world’s total, or 6.5 million units in 2022.
Electric-car sales in China, which is the world’s largest market for battery-powered vehicles, are expected to soar 35 per cent this year to 8.8 million units, according to UBS analyst Paul Gong.
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Chinese-made cars are also increasingly well received in markets from Russia and Southeast Asia to Europe and South America.
According to China Business Journal, the mainland’s carmakers exported a total of 1.07 million vehicles – including both petrol- and battery-powered cars – in the first quarter of this year, beating Japan’s export volume of 1.047 million units during the same period.
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Honda’s Chinese-made e:NS1, with a driving range of 510 kilometres, is priced from 175,000 yuan to 218,000 yuan on the domestic market.
