Previously I blogged about Thailand’s refusal to lower import taxes on vehicles from Malaysia down to an AFTA agreed rate of 5%. It wants to maintain it’s 20% current rate as it considers Malaysia’s non-tax barriers non-compliant under the ASEAN Free Trade Agreement (AFTA).
Examples of these non-tax barriers are import regulations like quotas, which allow Thailand to bring in only 50,000 cars annually despite the Malaysian market supporting the sales of 100,000 cars annually.
Of course in the spirit of the AFTA agreement, the two governments are still trying to sort this mess out. Thailand wants Malaysia to relax it’s regulations before it will lower it’s tax rates for incoming Malaysian vehicles. Thailand is of the opinion that there should not be export quotas and strict import regulations in a fair playing ground. 10% of the vehicles imported by Thailand annually comes from Malaysia.
Our Malaysian government is still waiting for full details on the Thai’s auto policy to be submitted for them before taking any further action. Minister of International Trade and Industry Datuk Seri Rafidah Aziz says there has not been any official communication on the details yet, and so far she has only read what she knows from the newspapers.
Thailand – which does not have any national carmakers of it’s own – has achieved immense success in carving out an automotive industry for itself through foreign investments. It is currently Toyota’s 2nd largest export production center after Japan itself, and is the world’s 2nd largest manufacturer of pick-up trucks after the United States. There are currently 15 auto assembly plants in Thailand, mostly Japanese, with a 16th (a larger facility owned by Toyota) due for completion in January 2007.
Total investment from Toyota alone amounts up to USD$900 million. Toyota’s total production is predicted to reach 550,000 vehicles by next year. It’s facilities there can currently churn out a maximum 650,000 vehicles a year. 90% of parts and materials are sourced locally, creating a lucrative supplier business for the locals there.
Let’s hope Malaysia can move forward the same way with the NAP!
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been trying too hard to protect P1 .. it's a shame.
yoyo. u were on NST today. Haha. 10 minutes with paul tan.
Anyways, I think that Thais are right. Government really has to deal with the fact that they cannot protect Proton anymore. Put an entity in a pool filled with no competition and it laxes. Put the same thing into a pool of hungry competitors and they will have to strive to survive, which of course is mainly beneficial to the consumers, with lower prices and higher quality.
Example:-
Satria Neo is not a bad car. But there is still room for improvement in MANY areas. Now we have to wait out for the test of time for it. If it does proof reliable then Proton would have just upped their ante one notch. Would the government ease more on the protection then?
all the major cars manufacturers already invested in Thailand. Tell me one valid reason why they should move all the production infrastucture to Malaysia. It's like mission impossible. What else our govt can do? it's already too late.. continue sucking our blood lor.
How long can our government afford to protect our national car manufacturers ? Another 5 years ? 10 yrs ? The short-sighted policy makers(BN) should wake up and come to their senses that in order for a car manufacturer to survive, they must be able to export their products in substantial amount and not relying solely or mainly…should i say on domestic market as what our national car are doing at the moment.
Why are we so afraid of competition ? We all know that if we adhere to AFTA regulations and agreements, cars like Honda Civic and Toyota Altis are going to sell at the range of RM50,000 to RM60,000….City and Vios in the range of RM40,000 to RM45,000. I guess Proton will still be able to sell their Waja and Gen-2 if they put the price tag in the range of RM35,000 to RM40,000, Satria Neo in the range of RM30,000-RM35,000 and Savvy RM25,000-RM30,000…….even geriatric car like Iswara can still sell like hot cakes if the price is between RM15,000-RM25,000, hahaha…..the same apply to Perodua, you know what's the competitive pricing should be…of course, in future if their built quality is catching up with the big players, they can increase their price accordingly….
If we don't impose those tariff and non-tariff barriers on cars from other ASEAN countries, under AFTA spirit, i guess they won't do the same on our car too…..Hey ! we may even be looking at a potential 400 million population ASEAN market….Wake up government of the day ! Start earning some foreign currency and not making money out of own rakyat (going no where !)
But, If our national car manufacturer can't produce cars with these sort of competitive price, i guess we are just no good and efficient in producing car and we should reserve our resources and capital to do other things which we are good at ! No scale of economy, just forget about it ! Probably better off using the existing plants to assemble more established brands….like what Thailand are doing.
There is a old chinese proverb used to say "Don't lop off the entire forest, just because you wanted to preserve one tree" (åˆ«ä¸ºäº†ä¸€æ£µæ ‘ï¼Œæ”¾å¼ƒæ•´ä¸ªæ£®æž—), I think the gov never learn that… too bad. Now is like we are giving out the opportunity to our neighbouring country…
One day we will left behind Thailand, just like singapore.. we will start import from Thai more & more.. TAP vs NAP… better thai reduce the import tarif to 5% & later apply 125% excise tax like we did, & see what Dato' Fidah goin to say.. our own medicine from msia.. baik punya.. kaw-kaw.. kasi taruk sama dia…
First padan muka to malaysia, and still want to find ways to become more despicable throw pride alltogether. Now muka tebal
it is useless…padan muke to m'sia…bout da tax…4get bout it…m'sian gov never sedar…****….****…*****…alwiz sucking our blood…
What a shame to Malaysian that started its national car projects 30 years ago but haven't got any success story…..unlike our Thai neighbour.
Memalukan…memang memalukan
*20 years ago…typo.
As we move forward.Proton will still exist…
its tim ethe G let us decide wat to do……….the nego shud be made known public n start poll on those issues……hehe…..
Cheers!!!!!!
It is shame and disappointment to Malaysia G, Toyota alone is USD900 million investment, wonder what is the total investment after adding up the investment of other auto companies, plus all the local companies that supply the part to these auto companies??? Shame, Shame, Shame, very soon Thailand will surpass us in economy…sigh
I think the negotiation won't deliver any good result. It's because the big M(mouth) would cakap again!!! You know he is a cakap banyak lol!
that big mouth talk alot coz he's the 1 create P1 mah!
If we put aside temporary the focus on the future of national automobile industry, are you all aware that this is Bolehland's core policy ??? It's not only being applied to ptotect local automobile industry alone, it also extend to other aspect like special priviledges to certain race, be it economically, academically, socially….the list goes on…This is how our government run things since Dasar Ekonomi Baru was first introduced and implemented 3 decades ago….."budaya tongkat untuk orang cacat" . This people just don't have the balls to compete on equal standing ground….not surprising that this mentality has sipped into protecting local automobile industry.
It is unlikely that things are going to change in five years time since we all know what 9th malaysian plan (2006-2010) is all about….Ya ya….i expect some will argue that they need to be further spoon-fed and protected until they are good enough to compete with others…..But remember ! With limited resources and globalisation, you just can't do it at the expense of your own people(those who don't need tongkat)……..before you realise it…..we have been left far behind by others !
"some will argue that they need to be further spoon-fed and protected until they are good enough to compete with others"
When the proton start business I really unable to understand what is in their mind? During that time, they surely still have the standard to compete with foreign cars. But they choose to be the gold fish on fish food in a small aquarium rather then swim out to the ocean and look for shark food.
A gold fish, stay in aquarium for 20 years or 200 years, will still be a gold fish. If let it swim to the ocean, if will only become part of the food chain and quickly consumed by big sharks.
Now we are talking about feed this gold fish for more time and let it grow up to become big shark first?
Thailand who do not have its own car but only foreign investment car production. But their car produced from 90% local content. Not only their people enjoying good quality car, the country earn national income by exporting most of the cars.
Malaysia has own national car as national pride, but their engines, gear box, many other parts, have to source from foreign source. The people have to pay extremely high price for foreign car, and the national pride do not have any significant market outside the country…
Whats went wrong in here!?
Nothing goes wrong here you know, rexis..Only with CORRUPTION AND KRONISME with main minister in our own Government here. Therefore, the rakyat money will mostly allocated to their own pocket with KRONISME style. Media can't deny it, but also can't publish it. We rakyat will suffer. They DO NOT, I repeat DO NOT helped us rakyat in making the nation economic grow. But, will only to increase their pocket money..
Yeaah.. both r u r corrrect… in fact i dun see we ve any 100% national car in bolehland.. many2 parts still from mitsu la, renault, Lotus etc… so what is the point? macam CKD juga.. kereta rojak.. i dun see any bright future for ROJAK cars… So I stress again to THAILAND government, pls reduce the import tarif to 5% and apply 125% ED tax to CBU cars from Malaysia.. Mcm ni even Pidah cant say a word… habis cerita…
what an embarassment..the Thais not even have English in their school studies..what they have is a G that is working for the Thais itself…for the 60 million people our G only working for their friends and partners.."rakyat" will be slaughter in exchange for no vision Proton.
my advice is we are determine to choose our destiny dont let other people laugh at our agony.malaysian should be treated like other nations in the world.
p/s with the RM1.92 per liter petrol, so expensive for an overpriced Proton cars we still cannot watch the one in a four year World Cup that is how bad our G treat our so charming MALAYSIANS….NO LIVE WC MATCHES.
paul, it might be interesting if we could somehow email this topic together with the comments to any national newspaper.
this way it might take the attention of the whole nation and to the extent of the G responding to the rakyat's thoughts ere.
who knws, they mght even revamp the currnt NAP to make it on par with the AFTA requiremnts. we will benefit with the restructurd taxes, they might benefit with the incoming foreign invsmnts n P1 might even excel better under this circumstances (lower tax, bigger petential market in Asean, etc)
just my 2 cents :)
Yeah local tv are big time sucks, NO LIVE WC MATCHES. Got live also only got non important live. But basically that is not related to how bad gov sucking our money. Still really missed the good old time where the ciggy company will sponsor most of the live matches on local TV.
forget it, our media all hampeh!.. cannot use one.. pak ma pei!!! this kind of news they wont publish… even the whole world knows.. better the public stay stupid…
" revamp the currnt NAP ??"..keep on dreaming la msian.. like Alice in WonderTaxland…
how msian can channel their frustration on overpriced car,high fuel price, and NO LIVE WC MATCH. first we have to know the main culprit?then make it also suffer like us?
I do not think the people whe created this super tax is invincible? if joint hand we can fight them, the problem is the people who impose the super duper tax and the people who sells parts to Proton not drivng the proton cars…then leave low income rakyats to suffer in Proton. this is not Democracy even Bush attacks other country but American themselves is well treated.
We all are blaming the government at the moment for all the grievances we are facing right now, in a sense it's correct but when we ponder deeper…don't we all realise that we are practising "sistem demokratik berparlimen" ? Who choose the government of the day then ???? It's me, you, him, her, It…..too bad, most Malaysian still have 3rd world mentality and there are just too few of us around to make any impact.
i agree wit u guyz…our media suxxx…hampeh….
now plikla…y dun hv any programme abt cars….like dapat auto….i like that programme…hhmm…in astro…abt motorsport kurang…Super GT..DTM…FIA gt…FIA WTCC….hhhmmm…auto motor and sport….top gear…manyla….y alwiz got the bola sepak programme byk….y xnak tunjuk byk car programme like dapat auto,top gear and auto motor and sport???takot effect national car market ka???
thers no harm in tryin rite…at least we as the concern rakyat have the initiative to bring this topic to the eyes of the general public.
im just frustrated wit the car prices ere… n y is it thailand should have more advanced automotive industry than us… we have more resources, we have better technology n have better infrastructure tahn them… it just dsnt make sense..
no wonder our economy is not gettin any better, bcoz thers just not enuf foreign funds inflow to our country.
p/s: sori for the sudden outrage :)
Yeah, I agree. Thailand should reduce import tax to 5%, but introduce excise tax of 125% which is applicable only to Malaysian CBU, but not from other ASEAN countries.
Msian TV dont want to show lots of motor programmes because it will share lots of new technologies new enhancement on motoring in other part of the world, then Msian will realise that Proton is a bullshit car plug and play company selling stupid overpriced moving jointly metal(yes you cant call them car actually)or a moving coffin.the G policy is to keep the rakyats stupid or less technology aware so they can still blood sucking all the way until the rest of rakyat life.for sure the motoring tv show will have contents like a specs comparison well the Proton not even can make into any motoring tv show in the world..if they do it is just for bashing.COME ON STOP BUYING PROTON if dont have money buy second hand, which is far better with our bad road and lots of jams.and NEW PROTON CARS ALSO DONT ACT LIKE NEW CAR WHERE GOT NEW CAR "ROSAK" BEFORE COME OUT FROM THE SHOP.
Ermm.. if Thai gov reduce the import tarif to 5%.. they only lose 15%, then apply Excise tax to Msian CBU they can get 125% back & more!!, 125%-15%=110%… 110% extra, Ok what??.. I hope there r some Thai officials see about this.. somebody need to whip our gov back side… & both of the gov oso tak payah gadoh2…
Maybe oneday the whole world can copy our NAP taxation method to the rest of Msian products, & then the gov can share the feelings of the rest of Msian now…
ps: Wait until gov apply GST soon…