Nissan labour unions unfazed by jobs cut

Nissan labour unions unfazed by jobs cut

Nissan’s two labour unions in Thailand are not worried about Nissan Motor Corporation’s announcement to cut 12,500 jobs worldwide, saying two car plants in Samut Prakan have high use rates and sell to both local and overseas markets.

In yesterday’s announcement, Nissan also said it will reduce global production capacity by 10% by the end of fiscal year 2022.

Bangkok Post contacted the two labour unions at Nissan’s plants on Bang Na-Trat Road KM21 and they insist the cost-cutting plan will not affect Thai operations.

A source said Nissan has two labour unions, Siam Nissan Labour Union for the passenger car plant and Nissan Motor Thailand Labour Union for the pickup plant.

A leader for the Nissan Motor Thailand Labour Union said the workload at Nissan’s plants in Thailand is very healthy, with the company normally opening applications for voluntary early retirement every year for older workers.

“Roughly 30 workers aged 50-60 apply for this scheme every year,” said the leader, who did not want to be named.

The leader said Ramesh Narasimhan, the newly appointed president for Nissan Motor Thailand, will meet employees at its manufacturing site in Samut Prakan on Aug 1.

“We are waiting for his announcement and clarification about the news, but we believe plants in Thailand will maintain their employee level,” the leader said.

Nissan’s manufacturing in Thailand has an annual production capacity of 295,000 vehicles, making Navara, Teana, Terra, Note, Almera, March, Sylphy and X-Trail.

“Nissan plans to make 190,000 vehicles in our 2019 fiscal year, ending next March. Roughly 120,000-130,000 units are for pickups, while the remainder is allocated to passenger cars,” the source said, adding the sentiment of sales and exports are also very healthy.

Both plants have roughly 4,000 workers, of which 30% are outsourced workforce.

“We are opening hiring for new outsourced workers because our production has two shifts now,” said the source.

In Thailand, Nissan sold 72,394 car in 2018, up by 21.2% from the sales in 2017 at 59,709 cars.

According to the industry report, Nissan posted 34,577 cars during the first half, up by 3.38% and sales for the period made up a 6.6% market share.

Nissan has set an ambitious target to achieve a double-digit market share by the fiscal year 2020.

Nissan also won the Board of Investment (BoI) privileges last July to invest 10.96 billion baht to produce a hybrid version using e-Power technology.

In January, Nissan was granted BoI incentives for a project worth 470 million baht to assemble batteries for its own e-Power cars.

Nissan has applied for the BoI’s incentives for battery EVs.

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