General Motors to close plant in northern Chile due weak market conditions
SANTIAGO, Chile: General Motors Corp. announced Thursday that it will close its assembly plant in northern Chile in July because of declining market conditions.
Julie T. Beamer, managing director of the company in Chile, said that the country "does not offer structural conditions favorable to the making of vehicles in a competitive manner."
Chile's "reduction of tariffs with automobile-producing countries has increased competitiveness of foreign providers," she added in a communique issued by the company. "As a result, it is no longer economically possible to assemble vehicles in Chile."
Around 900 jobs will be lost as the plant closes in late July in Arica, a region that already has one of the highest unemployment rates in Chile, around 12 percent.
"This is a very difficult decision for the company. We have been an important employer in Arica for 34 years," Beamer added.
The Arica plant produces about 9,000 small pickup trucks a year both for sale in the domestic market and for export.
The Associated Press, International Herald Tribune, March 6, 2008
