MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Lack of semiconductors and electronic components limiting Brazil's car production

Production figures in Brazil show 1,148,500 vehicles left the assembly lines in the first half of the year, 57.5% more than the 729,000 in the same period last year

Brazil's Association of Automotive Vehicle Manufacturers, ANFAVEA announced that export expectations for 2021 should reach 389,000, a significant increase over the previous estimate of 353,000. Furthermore, overseas sales will stand at 20% over the 2020 figure.

“It has never been so difficult to make projections in Brazil. In addition to socioeconomic variables, we now also have to take into account the pandemic situation, the vaccination pace, political instability, and this global semiconductor crisis, which we could hardly foresee,” ANFAVEA president Luiz Carlos Moraes, said.

Moraes also mentioned that a possible electricity rationing did not even enter the Association’s calculations.

When disclosing the sector’s balance for the first half of the year, Anfavea highlighted that the closing of the first half of 2021 was a little short of what the auto industry predicted, mostly due to the global crisis in the supply of semiconductors, materials used in all automotive electronic components.

According to production figures, 1,148,500 vehicles left the assembly lines in the first half of the year, 57.5% more than the 729,000 in the same period last year, when all factories were shut down for up to two months. In a fairer comparison, with the first half of 2019 (before the pandemic), there was a retraction of more than 300 thousand units, or 22%.

“We estimate that the lack of semiconductors prevented something between 100,000 and 120,000 vehicles from being produced in the first half. This problem affects all producing countries and has prevented the full resumption of the automotive sector”, explained Luiz Carlos Moraes.

In June, the production of 166,947 units was the worst in the last 12 months due to several stoppages at car factories throughout the month – a situation that has been happening since the first quarter.