Asahi Kasei Corporation has sales nearly the equivalent of US$10 billion. The company included the following in its balance sheet for the year ended March 31, 2011 (¥ in millions):
Property, plant, and equipment, net of accumulated depreciation
Buildings and structures .............. ¥177,789
Machinery, equipment, and vehicles ........ 144,220
Land ..................... 55,243
Lease assets ................... 5,463
Construction in progress .............. 22,173
Other .................... 13,466
Total property, plant, and equipment, net ...... ¥418,354
Footnote 8 contains the following:
Accumulated depreciation comprises the following (¥ in millions):
Buildings and structures .............. ¥ 231,474
Machinery, equipment, and vehicles ........ 1,047,912
Lease assets .................. 3,118
Other .................... 105,252
Total accumulated depreciation .......... ¥1,387,756
Footnote 2 says, “Depreciation is provided for under the declining-balance method for property, plant, and equipment, except for buildings which are depreciated using the straight-line method, at rates based on estimated useful lives of the assets, principally, ranging from 5 years to 60 years for buildings and from 4 years to 22 years for machinery, equipment and vehicles.”
1. Compute the original acquisition cost of each of the categories of assets listed under Property, Plant, and Equipment.
2. Explain why Asahi Kasei shows no accumulated depreciation for land or construction in progress.
3. Suppose Asahi Kasei had used straight-line instead of declining-balance depreciation for all asset categories. How would this affect the preceding values shown for Property, Plant, and Equipment?