Auto Maker Optimistic About U.S.-Japan Ties : Trade: The president of Mazda Motor Corp. said his company will increase auto and auto component exports to Japan fourfold--to $1.3 billion--by 1992.
The future of U.S.-Japan relations will be shaped not by politicians but by Japanese citizens in search of a “new national ideal,” Mazda Motor Corp. President Norimasa Furuta said Monday.
“The values of our people are more diverse. Consensus is more unlikely,” he said. “This situation calls for forceful, statesmanlike leadership. Bureaucrats . . . are not equipped and cannot be expected to lead a country to a broad national consensus.”
This may lead to a Japan that will be less pliant and less beholden to U.S. demands, Furuta said in a speech to the World Affairs Council of Orange County.
But Furuta, 62, is optimistic that relations between the two nations will withstand the strains of economic and political shifts, citing Mazda’s enduring relationship with Ford Motor Co. Ford acquired a 25% equity stake in Mazda in 1979.
“The Mazda-Ford relationship exemplifies the best in cooperation between auto makers,” he said. He said Mazda in Japan plans to increase its auto and auto component imports fourfold--to $1.3 billion--by 1992. While a major portion of imports will come from Mazda’s joint venture with Ford, the total also will include imports from Peugeot-Citroen Group in France and Fiat-Lancia in Italy, he added. Mazda’s purchases from overseas for the year ended in March are expected to reach $510 million, said Alan Goldberg, a Mazda spokesman.
Furuta’s local visit came in the wake of a sweeping trade pact signed Thursday between the United States and Japan. The accord is intended to reduce the $49-billion U.S. trade deficit with Japan by restructuring Japan’s economy to ease the way for imports and make it easier for American businesses to set up operations in Japan. Among the measures included in the agreement are tougher enforcement of anti-monopoly laws and a hike in public spending to increase economic activity within Japan.
Referring to the new trade accord, Furuta said he is convinced that the agreement will be “seriously undercut” if foreign public opinion is swayed by “revisionists” who contend that Japan acts only by its own rules and that “only harsh penalties and threats will cause Japan to respond in an equitable manner.”
California, Furuta said, is a major gateway to the Pacific Rim and will play a major role in U.S.-Japan relations. He encouraged Californians to take a leading role in the formation of trade policy with Japan.
Furuta visited Mazda’s local operations on Monday and leaves today for Japan. Mazda, the world’s 11th largest auto maker, has its research and development division, credit financing company, sales and marketing unit and U.S. holding company based in Irvine.
Furuta is among a handful of Japanese executives whose expertise on U.S.-Japan relations has been sharpened by years spent with the Ministry of International Trade and Industry where, as director general of its International Trade Bureau, he negotiated the current voluntary restraints agreement that limits Japanese auto exports to the United States to 2.2 million cars annually.
Furuta offered some observations on U.S.-Japan relations. Futura said Japan’s economy will grow despite signs pointing to a softening of its market--a weaker yen, a big drop in stock prices and higher interest rates.
He said that the global free-trade system, which has made the “second half of the 20th Century a showcase of economic growth,” must be preserved and that Japan must maintain its “amicable relations” with the United States.
