Mitsubishi Motors said Monday it has shuttered a subsidiary's Venezuela plant amid problems with worker discipline and a drop in productivity, adding more woes to the country's discombobulated manufacturing sector.
The Japanese auto maker said in a statement that a "high level of absenteeism, disobedience, aggression and lawlessness of some of the workers" drove the firm to temporarily close the factory, which is located in eastern Venezuela and also assembles Hyundai and Fuso cars.
Productivity at the assembly plant has fallen off a cliff. So far this year, the company makes just 33 cars a day, on average, with 1,412 workers. In 2004, with 590 workers, it was churning out 59 vehicles a day.
"Efficiency went from 74% in 2004 to 30% in 2009," the company said.
Run by MMC Automotriz, a Mitsubishi unit, the plant may still reopen if there is a guarantee for "the safety of its workers and employees in a climate of peace and discipline," Mitsubishi said.
The closure affects some 2,000 employees. The company said it was ready to negotiate with the Labor Ministry on reopening the plant.
Problems between workers and management have been going on for a "prolonged" period at the plant, the company said, but an agreement was reached in March with the help of the Labor Ministry.
Since then, nonetheless, the workers have been producing only about half of the "60 units per day, at a minimum, the union committed to produce," the company said.
Mitsubishi has manufacturing plants in four countries - the U.S., Netherlands, Thailand, and Japan. There are also a number of other plants which use Mitsubishi parts to assemble vehicles locally, and the Venezuela plant was one such plant, a company official said in an email. It also has these types of plants in Colombia and Brazil.
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