Jakarta. Japanese automotive giant Toyota set a new record high in export sales from its Indonesian plants last year by delivering close to 297,000 cars to more than 80 countries, the company’s local subsidiary announced on Wednesday.

The figure represents a 58 percent surge from export sales a year earlier, according to a statement from Toyota Motor Manufacturing Indonesia, which has supplied the global markets since 1987.

Toyota brands account for 63 percent of the total number of completely-built-up vehicles exported from the country last year.

For more than three decades, TMMI has sold 2.3 million Toyota cars including 578,000 units of the SUV model Fortuner which made up the biggest share of the company’s overall export sales.

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Toyota’s first export from Indonesia was a home-grown MPV model named Kijang back 35 years ago.

“Last year we began to export [small MPV] Toyota Veloz and it immediately became the biggest contribution at 70,000 units,” TMMI External Relations Director Bob Azam said.

“For this year we plan to expand our market destinations to the African region in our strategy to support the economic growth in Indonesia,” he added.

Despite the mighty surge in export sales last year, the growth for 2023 is set at a modest 5 percent.

Bob said economists have predicted a slowdown in the global economy that will affect the export performance of Indonesian manufacturers this year.

Opening new markets is a crucial strategy to maintain export growth and compensate for the sluggish demand in existing markets, he said. Last year, TMMI delivered cars to Australia for the first time.

TMMI export sales in 2022 comprised 149,200 SUVs (Fortuner, Rush, Raize), 101,000 MPVs (Kijang Innova, Sienta, Avanza, Town/Lite Ace, Veloz), and 46,800 sedans and hatchbacks (Vios, Yaris, Agya).