Argentina News.Net
Tuesday 10th January, 2012
The deal with Detroit based parent company, enabled by the Federal Automotive Transformation Scheme's $3.4 billion fighting fund, will be used to upgrade Ford models in a bid to revive sales following a shaky 2011 for Ford Australia with Falcon sales dropping by 36.5 per cent to 18,741.
Tyres, transmissions and body aerodynamics of the models will be changed and the CO2 footprint of the Falcon will be cut by 5.3 per cent.
The upgraded models will be launched in 2014.
"We are in the business of fighting for jobs.... Fighting for Australian jobs and fighting for partnerships that take us through the rest of this decade," said Industry Minister Kim Carr, who brokered the Ford deal.
Carr is also working on an agreement to safeguard 2,000 jobs at Holden's Fishermans Bend plant until 2020. That deal too looks likely to happen within six months.
The Ford deal comes on the heels of Toyota Australia spending $350 million on a fresh engine factory and switching its Altona factory to an all-new Camry.
Prime Minister Julia Gillard says federal and state measures to help secure the future of Ford manufacturing are just the start as the government is determined that Australia remains a hub for car manufacture.
"We were told during the days of the global financial crisis that it was impossible that Australia would emerge with a car industry," she told reporters in Gatton in Queensland. "We worked with Holden, we worked with Ford, we worked with Toyota and we came through."
Since 2008, the federal government has faced skepticism over the future of Australia's car industry. To ensure that car industry survives, the government has been negotiating and offering them bailouts.
The latest deal with Ford, which includes $34 million in public support, was struck in less than six months.
"In an unprecedented move for us we're talking about a product cycle ... that's beyond the next couple of years to provide some certainty," Joe Hinrichs, Ford Asia-Pacific president and chief executive told reporters at the Detroit Motor Show in the US.
Unions welcomed the deal and said it would help keep jobs alive in Victoria's car parts manufacturing sector.
"Having three manufacturers gives the economies of scale needed for component suppliers," Australian Manufacturing Workers' Union vehicle division secretary Ian Jones said.
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Source: http://www.argentinanews.net/story/202531290
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