Africa-Press – South-Africa. Deputy minister of trade, industry and competition Zuko Godlimpi says the government is still looking for a technical partner to help it acquire the Goodyear Tyres factory when it leaves SA next month.
This emerged from a plenary in the National Assembly on Wednesday afternoon, where ministers in the economic cluster were replying to questions from MPs. Goodyear announced in June that it would be closing its Eastern Cape factory.
ANC MP Lufefe Mkutu asked minister Parks Tau for the reasons that the department was unsuccessful in preventing the closure of the plant in Kariega.
Mkutu also asked what anti-dumping duties on unfairly traded imports of passenger, truck and bus tyres from China would be introduced by the International Trade Administration Commission (Itac) to preserve job security in the country.
Gimpi, responding to the question in Tau’s absence, said the department was concerned about the factory closure. However, he also pointed out that SA was not the only country affected by it.
“In March 2024, Goodyear announced the permanent closure of its manufacturing plant in Malaysia, and they also announced the closure of their plant in Germany by the end of 2025… The intention of such actions, as they say, is to reduce their production and operating costs and to enhance their competitiveness.”
He said Goodyear would continue to rely on its imports from plants in Thailand, Indonesia, China and Taiwan as part of its global strategy. He said Michelin was also scaling back its presence in Germany to reduce production costs.
“The DTIC has met Goodyear twice this year, the latest [this month]. In August, the Industrial Development Corporation sent a letter of expression of interest to Goodyear to say we were willing to intervene and buy those operations.
“Both the DTIC and the IDC were told that Goodyear has already closed down, and it had settled severance packages with workers. Total plant closure will be on October 15. However, Goodyear has indicated that it is still willing to meet anyone who can make an offer. However, such company may not use their technology to manufacture tyres in South Africa.”
He said the government would have to find a technical partner to make a compelling bid to buy up Goodyear’s assets in the country. The department is engaging with interested parties, including the union Numsa, to find a partner.
“The other partner the DTIC was in discussion with is only coming to South Africa in December to look at other investment opportunities in the tyre sector. This will clearly be too late to save the Goodyear plant.”
He said the government was looking to attract tyre manufacturers into the country so that the country’s capability to manufacture tyres is not lost as Goodyear exits.
ANC MP Mikateko Mahlaule asked what trade measures the department planned to introduce to prevent deindustrialisation in South Africa due to Goodyear’s exit. Godlimpi said larger markets found ways to circumvent the SA Africa introduced to protect local producers.
“It was the anti-dumping duties that we imposed, and then it became clear that there was some creative work that some countries were doing to circumvent those… Around May, for 200 days, we imposed anti-circumvention duties against imports from Vietnam, Thailand and Cambodia to provide urgent relief and counter transshipment practices and restore the effectiveness of the original anti-dumping measures.”
He said Itac was in the final stages of concluding an anti-circumvention investigation to ensure that unfair practices by exporters do not trouble the market.
DA MP Toby Chance asked what the department was doing to prevent large markets from dumping goods in the market and to incentivise the development of factories in South Africa to produce goods for the local market.
Godlimpi said South Africa was responding to Chinese imports by holding discussions with counterparts in China to develop factories and other operations in South Africa. He said, however, that this was not something that would be resolved in a month.
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