Nissan Vietnam stops production for 15 days

By Dat Nguyen April 3, 2020 | 01:29 am PT

A Nissan logo is pictured in an auto show. Photo by Reuters/Aly Song.

Nissan Vietnam will shut down its plant in the central city of Da Nang for 15 days starting April 5 to limit the spread of the novel coronavirus.

The company’s 25 dealers nationwide will also be closed from April 1-15 in line with the government’s social distancing campaign, the Japanese automaker said in a statement.

Before Nissan, Ford, Toyota, TC Motor and Honda had all shut down production temporarily in Vietnam to protect their employees amidst the rising number of confirmed Covid-19 infections in the country.

As of Friday, Covid-19 tally in Vietnam had risen to 233, of whom 85 have been discharged after recovery.

Japan’s Yamaha Motor has also shut down motorbike production from April 1 until April 15.

Auto sales in the first two months fell 27 percent year-on-year to 33,400 units, according to the Vietnam Automobile Manufacturers Association (VAMA).

Last year, car sales rose 11.7 percent to 322,322 units, it said.