Stellantis, which will start building its first auto plant in South Africa this month, is considering expanding into the production of so-called new-energy vehicles in the country.
In five years “it’s a high probability but there’s no final decision,” he said in an interview on Thursday at an investment conference in the city of Gqeberha.South Africa’s car industry, which accounts for more than 5% of gross domestic product and employs over 116,000 people, is in danger of being left behind by the global switch to EVs especially in its biggest export market, the European Union.
“You need a local market,” Whitfield said, saying that in the absence of one such a facility would be built in a country where a significant proportion of output could be sold locally. The African country, he said, should learn from its experience with exporting raw platinum for use in the manufacture of the pollution-curbing auto-catalysts fitted to internal combustion engines. Few are made in South Africa.