China gains thanks to US action against Toyota
- Source: Global Times
- [01:19 March 03 2010]
- Comments
By Chen Chenchen
In the US, 18 consumer complaints triggered Toyota Motor Corp's recall of 4.26 million vehicles with flawed accelerator pedals.
This is a huge blow to Toyota.
From another viewpoint, many Chinese consumers find this positive.
The 2010 Pruis and 2009-10 RAV4 sport utility vehicles are now on Toyota's voluntary recall list. Both landed in the US before China, which exposed the vehicles' fatal defects well in advance for Chinese consumers.
In other words, had the two models been launched first in China, instead of the US, the automaker may not have been compelled to act.
Consider the statistics. As the former largest auto consumer market, the US has forced recall of more than 20 million cars and 24 million tires. Almost every automaker has faced recall cases in the US.
China has implemented its laws and regulations concerning auto recall since 2004, and has so far recalled more than 3 million cars.
In 2008, 20 million cars and tires were recalled in the US. In contrast, though China became the world's largest auto market in 2009, only 1.3 million cars were recalled that year.
The difference in recall figures underscores differences in mechanisms for supervising and handling consumer complaints. In developed countries like Japan and the US, vehicle regulation authorities often wield great power. They collect sta-tistics like the number of accidents throughout the year, analyze these, and initiate independent probes. The investigation results are authoritative, and acts as a deterrence against quality compromises by vehicle makers.
For instance, in the wake of collective consumer complaints and charges against the potential risks of Toyota's vehicles, there were probes by both the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA) and the House Energy and Commerce Committee into safety loopholes.
The regulators arranged meetings with Toyota's top executives, and checked documentation. Hearings on Capitol Hill were also held for deeper scrutiny. Despite Toyota's PR attempts to avoid several probes by NHTSA, the supervising mechanism had its way and solved the problem.
