CNH opens US$ 555.6 million plant in Sorocaba
O Estado de S. Paulo
Case New Holland (CNH) has invested R$ 1 billion (US$ 555.6 million) in its new plant, opened yesterday in Sorocaba, in the interior of São Paulo, where agricultural machinery and equipment for construction will be manufactured. "With this unit, we open the biggest and most modern production center of the company in Latin America", said the CEO of Case New Holland, Valentino Rizzioli.
The new plant may produce up to 8 thousand machines a year, almost one third of the number of products manufactured by CNH in Brazil in 2009. Last year, 23 thousand machines were made in the country, among tractors, harvesters and construction machinery. The unit, according to the Officer, will integrate the global system of production of the company, with conditions to provide components and machines to the entire world. With the 526 thousand square meter unit of Sorocaba, CNH will generate 2 thousand direct jobs and another 4 thousand indirect ones.
The inauguration happens at the same time of the period of resumption of the sales in the sector. The National Association of the Automachine Vehicles Manufacturers (Anfavea) foresees growth from 10% to 15% in the sales of agricultural machines in 2010.
Such performance should be strongly based on the Investment Maintenance Program (PSI, in Portuguese), in which the interest rate of the credit line of the Finame (Special Agency for Industrial Financing), of the National Development Bank (BNDES), was reduced from 10.5% to 4.5%. The measure pushed the sales of agricultural machinery of high power and helped overturn the trajectory of decline of the sector as of the last quarter of 2009.