Top quality is the bottom line, says DaimlerChrysler's Kopke
THE MULTI-LEVEL car terminal which has been built in East London harbour can store 2 800 vehicles at any one time and handle 50 000 units annually, while there is the potential to extend throughput to as much as 180 000.
But it is every single vehicle which goes through the terminal to the outside world that must be aimed at changing the image of Africa as a whole, says Christoph Kopke, chairman of DaimlerChrysler South Africa.
Addressing the gathering at the official opening of the car terminal, he said it was now the manufacturers' duty to change the international mindset from something negative to something positive 'when they open the bonnet and see the Made in South Africa stamp on it.'
Every car we export must carry the message that it represents top quality. In that it will represent every member of the workforce striving to improve the national image abroad. We are today the role models to encourage investment in the country. To do so we have to put our shoulders to the wheel, so to speak, and achieve quality, quantity and acceptable cost levels.
This terminal and the manufacturing plant behind it are the culmination of a dream we have had since the early 1990s. We now have the facilities and the workforce to perform to the levels the world requires and we have to do it to perfection.
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