TOKYO (Reuters) – Nissan Motor is considering shifting some domestic production of U.S.-bound vehicles to the U.S., the Nikkei reported on Saturday, as President Donald Trump ramps up trade tariffs on nations worldwide.
As early as this summer, Nissan plans to reduce production at its Fukuoka factory in western Japan and shift some manufacturing of its Rogue SUV to the United States to mitigate the impact of Trump’s tariffs, the business newspaper said, without citing the source of its information.
The Japanese automaker’s Rogue SUV, a key model in the U.S. market, is now produced in Fukuoka and the United States, the report said.
On Thursday, Nissan said it would not take new orders from the U.S. for two Mexican-built Infiniti SUVs after earlier Trump tariff announcements, marking, a drastic scale-back of its operations at a joint venture plant.
The automaker now plans to maintain two shifts of production of the Rogue at its Smyrna, Tennessee, plant after announcing in January it would end one of the two shifts this month.
Nissan sold about 920,000 vehicles in the U.S. last year, of which about 16% were exported from Japan, the Nikkei said, adding the planned production shift could hit local suppliers’ businesses.
(Reporting by Mariko Katsumura; Editing by William Mallard)
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