Volvo headquarters in Gothenburg has announced the elimination of 2,500 jobs, but if this will effect the Ghent plan is as yet unknown
Volvo Car Gent is assessing the potential impact of the announcement from Swedish headquarters that the care manufacturer will scrap some 2,500 jobs worldwide in the coming months. While Volvo’s press release stated that 2,000 of these jobs would be in Sweden, the location of the other 500 remains unclear.
The job cuts will be made through “ending consultant contracts, through natural attrition and by targeted exit packages to employees,” the company said. Outside its home country, Volvo Cars has factories in Ghent, the United States and China, and is building another in Slovakia.
Belgium’s last carmaker
“We will look internally at what these measures could mean for our site,” said Barbara Blomme of Volvo Car Gent. More than 6,000 people work at the Ghent plant – Belgium’s only remaining car manufacturing facility. Last year, 212,177 cars rolled off its production line.
The future of the site has been uncertain in recent years, which had led Volvo Gent to consider producing cars for other manufacturers in future. In July this year, however, the Swedish manufacturer – which is majority-owned by China’s Geely Holding Group – said it was committed to the future of its Ghent factory, after reaching an agreement with the federal and Flemish governments on support measures worth up to €119 million.
