Toyota Corolla Cross production line officially opened by President Cyril Ramaphosa
There is no denying the importance of the locally produced Corolla Cross, particularly the Hybrid model, from a local perspective. We travelled to Durban to the Toyota production facility where we witnessed President Cyril Ramaphosa cut the ribbon, marking the production line for the new model open, officially.
Why is the Cross an important car?
In addition to one of the automotive world’s most popular nomenclatures, the Corolla, now morphing into a crossover, the Corolla Cross range also includes the first Hybrid model to be produced locally by Toyota. With the slow and steady decline of smaller capacity diesel engines in passenger cars, the introduction of an attainable hybrid powertrain in the in-demand crossover-style body, that just so happens to be sold and marketed by the most popular vehicle brand in terms of new car sales, signifies a significant step towards the future. The Cross is also the first Toyota based on the brand’s TNGA platform to be produced locally, an architecture now used by 32 new Toyota and Lexus models as of the third quarter of 2021.
The Japanese marque has an ambitious target where it aims to sell more of the hybrid variants of the Cross than it does the traditional petrol-only models. President and CEO of TSAM Andrew Kirby is quoted as saying “We plan to fundamentally change the NEV landscape in South Africa from a few hundred NEV’s a year to well over 10 000 units per year,”
Significant investment
The brand’s Prospection-based plant in KwaZulu Natal has been upgraded over the past half a decade in anticipation of the Cross as Andrew Kirby says “If you tally up the investments we’ve made in this plant spanning the last five years – of which Corolla Cross accounts for R2.6 billion, we arrive at a cumulative figure of over R6.5 billion. So, we are therefore committed to further developing and strengthening our business in South Africa and making a difference in the country, our communities, our suppliers, dealers, customers and of course in own employee’s lives.”
The production of the Corolla Cross is also said to have created some 575 new jobs at the factory, while an additional 1 200 jobs have been created across the supply chain as a result of the newcomer.
Our President, Mr. Cyril Ramaphosa was in attendance, and was treated to a brief plant tour before he cut the ribbon to officially open the production line for the Corolla Cross before addressing the media, the workers at the Prospection facility. The President had the following to say “I had called upon Japanese carmakers to strengthen their investment in South Africa. A few months later at the second South Africa Investment Conference, Mr Andrew Kirby came up to stage to announce Toyota’s new investment (R2,6 billion)… I am particularly pleased to see that the announcement that was made has led to the creation of so many jobs – a total of 1 775 jobs made through the announcement of the investment [of the Corolla Cross production].”
