An auto analyst is warning that Canadian auto production could decrease by as much as 25 per cent by 2020.

Auto production in Canada is projected to fall from 2.454 million vehicles to 1.823 million, according to Joe MacCabe, president of auto consulting company Automotive Compass. That’s a loss of 600,000 units.

“A lot of the manufacturing in Canada has shared manufacturing in other places in NAFTA. As the exchange rate punishes labour costs in Canada … it’s more cost feasible for some manufactures to move their operations to build the same exact vehicle on the same exact platform in a less costly area,” McCabe told CBC News on Monday.

MacCabe said Canadian manufacturing still has a lot of benefits, including efficiency and productivity.

“But the exchange [rate] is overshadowing. The strong dollar is punishing the ability to produce there,” he said from his offices in Pennsylvania.

MacCabe said “we’ll see a lot of business south of the Ohio border.”