Peugeot bakkie set for local production
Local assembly plans for the Landtrek bakkie are back on track in the Eastern Cape, with more models set to join the line.
After a lengthy delay, Peugeot parent company Stellantis South Africa has confirmed that local production of its Landtrek bakkie is expected to start “by late 2028” at the Coega Special Economic Zone outside Gqeberha, reports the Citizen.
A R3-billion investment in the assembly plant was announced back in 2023, with Stellantis initially hoping to start production as early as 2025. But this never materialised, with the manufacturer indicating that the process was “under review”.
But now Charl Timms, commercial director at Stellantis Middle East & Africa, has confirmed that the project is still very much on track despite the delay. And that the Peugeot Landtrek is not be the only model that will be built there.
Peugeot Landtrek production delayed
“Two, three, five years ago when the original decision was made the local bakkie market looked very different. It was mainly your local manufacturing OEMs bar GWM who were dominating that market. And the GWM P Series also only came to market by 2021. Since than the market has changed significantly,” Timms says.
“We’ve had global representatives here and we are busy finalising the production facility. We will made a formal announcement in this quarter and it will be a multi-model plant. There will definitely be more than one model built here as you can’t put all your eggs in one basket.
“So the production facility is still very much on track. It was just sitting with all the stakeholders who took a step back. They decided to look at the possibilities of building passenger cars in the form of an SUV. A wider scope of the market is key.”
List of locally built bakkies grows
The Peugeot Landtrek is set to become the seventh locally manufactured bakkie. The others include the Toyota Hilux (Prospecton), Ford Ranger (Silverton), VW Amarok (Silverton), Isuzu D-Max (Struandale), Foton Tunland (Coega) and Mahindra Pik Up (Durban). Unlike the others, the Mahindra though is assembled from semi-knockdown (SKD) form.
The Landtrek, which shares a platform with the Changan Hunter, is built in various facilities around the world. One of them is Ghana where its done in SKD form.
It is still unclear which other models will share the assembly line with the Peugeot bakkie. There are plenty of options underneath the Stellantis umbrella which brands such as Alfa Romeo, Chrysler, Citroën, Dodge, Fiat, Fiat Professional, Jeep and Opel.
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