DETROIT : 1993 Auto Agenda

Leaders of the international auto industry convene for their annual World Congress in America’s Motor City this weekend under dramatically different circumstances than prevailed at last year’s meeting: Japan is losing money, Europe is restructuring and U.S.-based producers seem on the mend.

With President-elect Bill Clinton, an advocate of managed trade, en route to Washington, top Japanese executives here will be talking about cooperation. Latin American experts will plumb Mexico’s auto prospects under the new North American Free Trade Agreement, and the chairman of Germany’s BMW will hold forth on his new auto plant in South Carolina.