Toyota's job cuts in Japan have hit the country's manufacturing district hard, leaving factories and small businesses reeling as orders dry up in the global recession.
Hit by the financial crisis and a crippling rise in the yen, Toyota Motor Corp has forecast its first-ever annual operating loss in its 70-year history. It has also unveiled an 11-day output suspension that is virtually unprecedented in scale.
That is a sharp turnaround from as recently as 2007 when Toyota was riding high after eight years of earnings growth that made it the world's biggest car-maker ahead of General Motors Corp.
With Toyota's sales in the United States, its biggest market, declining by 37 per cent in December, the pain is being felt all along the supply chain in Nagoya and across the Aichi prefecture, which thanks to car manufacturing is one of the most affluent regions in Japan.
Industrial production in central Japan, including Aichi prefecture, sank 12 per cent in October from a year earlier as auto exports fell on weak global demand.
An estimated 10,000 job losses are expected in Aichi - the biggest cut among Japan's 47 prefectures, a government survey showed.
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