FAW-Toyota’s Prado officially discontinued

Shanghai (Gasgoo)- FAW-Toyota's Prado officially bowed out of production on June 23, 2020 with its outputs ending at 346,706 units, as it has not suited China's regulations on fuel consumption and emission.

At the same time, Sichuan FAW Toyota Motor also decided to shift the annual capacity of 45,000 units from producing the Prado 3.5L SUVs to making the Avalon vehicles.

In April 1990, Toyota added the long-wheelbase 5-door versions to the Land Cruiser 70 wagon and van, of which the wagon model was separated as the Land Cruiser Prado to compete in the market that was then dominated by the Mitsubishi Pajero.

With the second-generation model released in May 1996, the Land Cruiser Prado line steered toward a more passenger-oriented 4-wheel-drive (4WD) vehicle. The third-generation Land Cruiser Prado was released in October 2002, and was introduced into China in 2003 for local production. Then the automaker launched the fourth one in September 2009.

(Prado, photo source: FAW-Toyota)

After China issued the Measures for the Parallel Administration of the Average Fuel Consumption and New Energy Vehicle Credits of Passenger Vehicle Enterprises (called “the Dual Credit Policy” for short) in 2017, the Prado, whose unique selling points are large displacement, powerful off-road performance, was under the threat of being discontinued due to its over 11 liters per 100km of combined fuel consumption.

According to China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT), Sichuan FAW Toyota posted negative NEV credits of 105,199 points and 166,003 points in 2018 and 2019 respectively, more than that of most companies who recorded negative credits.

On the other hand, the parallel-import Prado SUVs will also disappear in the domestic market after the production was ceased. Importers are allowed to declare the parallel-import cars to customs as long as they receive the “3C Certificate”, or “CCC” (also called China CCC Certification), a mandatory product certification system with the aim protecting consumer's security through the supervision of products concerning health, hygiene, security, environment and anti-fraud. However, the premise on which the release of the “3C Certificate” is based is that the vehicles to be imported must have corresponding Chinese-spec versions on sale, according to a document issued by China's Certification and Accreditation Administration.