VW to invest millions at Forest plant in Brussels

14 February 2005

BRUSSELS – The German car company Volkswagen has said it intends to invest millions in its factory in the Brussels suburb of Forest.

The promise was made by Norbert Streingraeber, the managing director of VW Forest, in an interview he gave to the Monday edition of De Tijd.

He said he couldn’t give the exact figure that would be invested, but the investment would amount to hundreds of millions of euros.

“The capital will be used to prepare the factory for the building of several future models from the Volkswagen group,” he said.

The money will be invested over the next few years, in the run up to 2010, chiefly in the assembly department.

Streingraeber also denied rumours that the Forest factory was threatened with closure.

Workers have been worried ever since last year when 600 of the factory’s 5570 jobs were axed.

In 2004, Volkswagen announced 5,000 jobs would go world wide in the face of poor car sales and a sluggish automobile market.

[Copyright Expatica 2005]

Subject: Belgian news