Sales of Czech car manufacturers and parts suppliers rose by 17.7 percent to 1.478 trillion crowns last year. Exports increased by 23 percent to 1.266 trillion. This was announced by representatives of the Association of the Automotive Industry.
Sales of final producers increased by 23.4 percent to 908 billion crowns. Parts suppliers earned 543 billion, i.e. 10.4 percent more year-on-year. Another 27.6 billion crowns belong to special-purpose organizations.
Car production returned to pre-crisis levels, rising 14.8 percent year-on-year to 1.398 million passenger cars. The number of electric vehicles produced rose by 34 percent to 181,000.
“Companies in the automotive industry were able to cope with the fading volatility in the supply chains and overall achieved better results than a year earlier. The available data also show the development of the production of electric cars and their components, which is an area that claims considerable investment,” said the president of the association Martin Jahn.
The number of employees in the association’s companies increased by one percent to 141,862 people. The average wage in the sector rose by 8.8 percent to CZK 54,637 per month, and was thus 26 percent above the average wage in the Czech Republic.
“The automotive sector is going through one of the most fundamental transformations and we are now in a period where bread is broken. Assuming that it is possible to ensure greater flexibility of the labor market, keep energy prices at a reasonable level and at the same time take specific national measures to support the development of science and research , there is no reason why Czech companies would not succeed in the world car market in the long term. We have to get used to that, especially the Asian competition. But the simple imposition of tariffs on Chinese electric cars will not solve this by itself,” Jahn pointed out.
According to Jahn, Europe is likely to re-evaluate the Green Deal, especially considering the ability to produce electric cars at attractive prices, the availability of infrastructure and customer options. “It’s not that we don’t want the Green Deal, but we want it to be real and that producers don’t have to move away from Europe,” he added. According to him, the new European leadership after the elections is more realistic on this issue.
According to Jahn, this year will be a record year for car companies, and production growth could be at the level of five or more percent. “However many challenges we will have to continue to work with, I am confident, and the first five months of 2024 indicate, that the automotive industry is in for another record year, with production results well above last year and moving us beyond the production volumes of the pre-crisis years.” Jahn concluded.
The automotive industry is the most important branch of the Czech Republic’s manufacturing industry, accounting for almost ten percent of its GDP. It directly employs approximately 180,000 workers, and indirectly, i.e. including related fields, almost 500,000 people.
