Prague - While Czech banks remain largely immune to the global credit crisis, the domestic industry starts being affected as the spilling of the crunch from the US to western Europe cools demand for Czech products.
Škoda Auto, the biggest Czech carmaker and a subsidiary of Germany's Volkswagen group, has announced it will have to reduce production more than it expected earlier. The news was broken by the daily Mladá fronta Dnes, quoting the company's board member Fred Kappler.
The company, based in Mladá Boleslav, will suspend production for a whole week at the end of October, cutting overall output by 13,000 vehicles.
Originally, Škoda planned to suspend production for only two days.
The next production break is scheduled for Christmas.
Kappler told the paper that Škoda now has to revise its production targets for 2009. He added his company does not plan an overall reduction of output, but that its growth rate will probably be lower than planned.
Czech lorry manufacturer Tatra last week also announced a cut in production, citing the global credit crunch as the main reason.
