Toyota sees potential for exporting U.S. trucks

By Soyoung Kim

TRAVERSE CITY, Michigan (Reuters) - Toyota Motor Corp is considering exporting U.S.-made vehicles as it sees potential demand for its large pickup trucks and sport utility vehicles overseas, the automaker's U.S. manufacturing chief said on Monday.

Toyota could also cut more temporary U.S. manufacturing jobs if the downturn in the U.S. auto industry deepens, as it has cut U.S. truck production amid a collapse in demand for the once-popular, gasoline-thirsty vehicles, the executive said.

Toyota, now No. 2 in U.S. sales behind General Motors Corp, is facing the unprecedented problem of excess capacity in the U.S. market as demand for large vehicles such as its Tundra pickup trucks and Sequoia SUVs has tumbled in the wake of record gasoline prices.

The automaker is also contending with a strong yen, which eats into profits earned abroad when foreign currencies are converted into the Japanese currency.

Steve St. Angelo, senior vice president of Toyota Motor Engineering and Manufacturing in North America, said the automaker is evaluating the idea of exporting the Tundra pickup and the Sequoia SUV, now exclusively built in the U.S. market.

Better-selling cars such as the Camry and the Corolla are not part of that consideration because Toyota "cannot build the cars any faster than right now in the United States," a Toyota spokesman said later.

Toyota has already cut about 500 temporary jobs this year and sees a possibility of additional reductions depending on a "fluctuation in the market," St. Angelo told Reuters on the sidelines of an industry forum in Traverse City.

Temporary workers account for 10 percent of Toyota's 30,000-member U.S. manufacturing work force.