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Europe to See 3% Growth in Light Vehicle Production in 2010

According to a study by JD Power, the Old Continent will experience a 3 percent increase in light vehicle production in 2010, with all the projected fall of the market taken into account. The main reason behind the somewhat positive numbers is the fact that the market is slowly stabilizing and many of the plants idled this year time and again will reopen their lines next year.

"The point is this: there was a need for massive destocking at the end of 2008 and in the early part of this year, with around 2m cars of excess stock needing to be removed," Arthur Maher, JD Power analyst said in an interview with just-auto.com.

"That's been worked through now and even though the market is turning down in Europe, the industry will not have to suffer a repeat of the massive downtime which aggressively took hold last December."

The total number of light vehicles built next year will thus hit the 17 million units mark, far better than the 21 percent decline registered this year. According to the study, European production capability is now operating at some 60 percent of capacity, with some major facilities outputting as low as 20 percent.

"This serious overcapacity situation is not going to show any significant improvement in the foreseeable future and therefore any improvement to market demand will be insufficient to remove the problem - it is something that the OEMs cannot ignore for long," Mahner concluded.
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About the author: Daniel Patrascu
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Daniel loves writing (or so he claims), and he uses this skill to offer readers a "behind the scenes" look at the automotive industry. He also enjoys talking about space exploration and robots, because in his view the only way forward for humanity is away from this planet, in metal bodies.
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