NAGOYA, Japan (Reuters) – A shift to an electrical vehicle-only future would result in job losses amongst those that have been engaged on engine-related applied sciences, together with on the many suppliers within the sector, Toyota Motor (NYSE:)’s chairman stated on Thursday.

“There are 5.5 million people involved in the automotive industry in Japan. Among them are those who have been doing engine-related (work) for a long time,” Akio Toyoda advised reporters.

“If electric vehicles simply become the only choice, including for our suppliers, those people’s jobs would be lost,” he stated, including he favored gasoline automobiles.

Toyota, the world’s greatest automaker by gross sales, has been extra cautious in its strategy to EVs than different makers. That is serving to it at present as international EV gross sales gradual and it advantages from demand for its increasing hybrid line-up, together with in its prime market the USA.

It champions what it calls a “multi-pathway” technique towards zero-carbon emissions that features EVs, hybrids, hydrogen fuel-cell automobiles and different powertrain know-how.

In January, Toyoda stated EVs would at most account for 30% of the worldwide auto market, with hybrids, hydrogen fuel-cell and fuel-burning automobiles making up the remaining. He didn’t specify a timeframe for that forecast.

Toyoda made the feedback to reporters on the unveiling of a bust of his father, Shoichiro Toyoda, at Nagoya College in central Japan.

The elder Toyoda, who died aged 97 final 12 months, led Toyota in the course of the Nineteen Eighties, when the corporate reshaped the worldwide auto market, upending Detroit’s dominance. He additionally oversaw the launch of the posh Lexus model and the Prius hybrid.