大众在卢旺达建立首个汽车组装工厂

First gear
低速行驶

VW opens Rwanda’s first car-assembly plant
大众在卢旺达建立首个汽车组装工厂

The vehicles will be used in a new car-sharing and ride-hailing service
卢旺达大众汽车将提供共享新车服务和叫车服务

HOW to sell cars when most people can’t afford to buy one? That is the conundrum for Volkswagen in Rwanda, where it is opening the country’s first car-assembly plant. A new Polo costs 33 times the average Rwandan income. Most cars on the road are second-hand imports. Rwanda absorbs perhaps 3,000 new cars a year, says Thomas Schäfer, VW’s chief in Africa. Past projects by carmakers in Africa, he admits, have ended in “monumental failure”.
据英国《经济学人》6月28日的消息：在大多数人买不起汽车的时候，又该如何销售汽车呢？这是大众集团(Volkswagen)在卢旺达面临的难题。目前，大众集团正在卢旺达建立首个汽车组装厂。一辆新大众Polo的售价是卢旺达人均收入的33倍。卢旺达路上行驶的汽车大多数是二手进口货。大众集团驻非洲首席执行官托马斯•谢弗（Thomas Schäfer）表示，卢旺达市场每年大约消化3000辆新车。他还承认，汽车制造商以往在非洲的项目均以“巨大失败”而告终。 

Yet there was a hopeful mood when VW launched its operations in Kigali, the Rwandan capital, on June 27th. The moment opens ”a new chapter in Rwanda’s journey,” said Paul Kagame, the president, after taking a demonstration model for a spin. In truth, little of the manufacturing will happen locally, at least to begin with. VW will build its vehicles elsewhere, partly dismantle them, then put them back together in Rwanda.
6月27日，大众集团在卢旺达首都基加利启动业务时，还是满怀希望。卢旺达总统保罗•卡加梅（Paul Kagame）乘坐样车兜风了一圈。他随后表示，这一刻在卢旺达“开启了新征程，谱写了新篇章”。 事实上，至少从起步阶段来说，很少有企业会在当地从事制造业。大众将会在别处建造汽车，拆卸部分零件，然后将它们一起运往卢旺达组装。

Paul Kagame, President of Rwanda
卢旺达总统保罗•卡加梅

The real novelty is how the cars will be used. VW is linking production to a ride-hailing and car-sharing service, stocked with its own vehicles. More people will pay to use a car, it reasons, than can afford to own one. At first, firms and government agencies will be able to use shared vehicles; from 2019 a similar service will be rolled out to the general public, with cars stationed around the city. Anyone with the mobile app will also be able to call up a lift, starting this October. The cars will be used for a few years, then sold into the second-hand market. The $20m project will initially produce 1,000 vehicles, with capacity to churn out 5,000 units a year.
真正的新奇所在是如何使用大众汽车。大众集团计划利用自己生产的汽车，推出叫车服务和共享汽车服务。该公司表示，更多人会乐意花钱使用汽车，而买不起汽车。首先，企业和政府机构将能够使用共享汽车服务；从2019年起，一项类似服务将面向公众推出，汽车将在城市周边停放。从今年10月开始，任何会使用这款手机应用的用户都可以叫车。这些车将首先被使用几年，然后再销售到二手市场。大众在该项目投资2000万美元，前期计划每年生产1000辆汽车，而后年产量高达5000辆。

Kigali is a small, orderly place in which to test the idea. If it works, VW could replicate it. It has recently restarted assembly in Kenya and Nigeria, after decades away, and hopes to enter Ghana and Ethiopia. Mr Schäfer likens VW’s African ambitions to its decision to enter China in 1985. At the time, Chinese car-ownership rates were lower than in most African countries today. Now, VW sells over 3m passenger cars a year there.
基加利是一个小而有序的地方，用来验证这一构想。如果行之有效，大众可以复制这一模式。最近，大众在肯尼亚和尼日利亚重启组装线，希望在过数十年后进军加纳和埃塞俄比亚。托马斯•谢弗将大众开拓非洲的雄心壮志同该公司1985年进军中国的决策做了对比。当时，中国的汽车拥有率比大多数非洲国家都要低。现在，大众每年在中国售出300多万辆汽车。

Some help comes from African governments, which shield producers from competition. Kenya plans to lower the maximum age for imported vehicles, from eight years to five. Nigeria imposes tariffs of up to 70% on car imports. Yet protection is often patchily implemented.
非洲多国政府提供了一些帮助，旨在保护汽车生产商免遭竞争影响。肯尼亚计划将进口车辆的最大车龄从8年降至5年。尼日利亚对汽车进口征收高达70%的关税。不过，这些保护政策往往只是部分得到执行。

For now, cautious carmakers are edging along in first gear. Firms such as Peugeot, Nissan and Toyota have also opened new operations in Africa, often in partnership with local firms. Like VW, they are typically assembling knock-down kits, rather than building new cars from scratch. There is a long road ahead.
当下，很多汽车制造商在谨慎地低速挪动。标致、日产和丰田等公司也在非洲开展了新业务，通常是同当地公司合作。而大众只是典型地组装一些配套零件，而非从头开始造新车。前方是任重而道远。(译：龚嘉诚/郝静） 

https://www.economist.com/news/business/21745266-vehicles-will-be-used-new-car-sharing-and-ride-hailing-service-vw-opens-rwandas-first

https://www.volkswagen-media-services.com/en/detailpage/-/detail/An-automotive-revolution/view/7223505/7a5bbec13158edd433c6630f5ac445da?p_auth=eV0rfW8f

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