Volkswagen Expands Social Commitment In South Africa

The Volkswagen Group is underscoring its social commitment in South Africa with further projects. The Chairman of the Board of Management of Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft, Prof. Dr. Martin Winterkorn, and the President of the Volkswagen Global Group Works Council, Bernd Osterloh, re-affirmed the Group’s social responsibility and announced three new corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives on Friday. The Volkswagen workforce and the Company have been committed to helping people in South Africa for many decades.

These latest projects undertaken by Volkswagen include €2 million for a youth center at the Group’s location in Uitenhage. This investment will be used for building and running the youth center for four years. The new facilities are part of the LoveLife Trust. The focus is on the fight against Aids. LoveLife runs 19 multi-purpose centers across South Africa, including medical facilities, counseling rooms, a library, sports and leisure activities and a local radio station. The LoveLife programs are implemented by a voluntary national youth aid organization called “Groundbreakers” and involve the participation of some 4,000 schools, 500 government clinics and over 150 community-based non-government organizations in South Africa. Volkswagen is expanding its activities in the fight against Aids in South Africa with this project.

“Volkswagen takes its role in the new South Africa very seriously,” Winterkorn said. “We not only provide some 6,000 secure, skilled jobs for the region at our plant, but also have an extensive community commitment. We have a particular interest in the country’s young people. The youth center and our other initiatives help South African children to a better future,” he added.

“Volkswagen employees have maintained close relations with South Africa for decades. For us, solidarity is not an empty word and does not stop at the factory gates. Over the years, more than €2.7 million have been channeled into South Africa under the ‘A chance to play’ and ‘One hour for the future’ aid projects,” Group Works Council Chairman Osterloh said. Dieter Haller, the German Ambassador to South Africa, Prof. Dr. Horst Neumann, the Member of the Board of Management of Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft for Human Resources, Prof. Dr. Jochem Heizmann, Member of the Board of Management for Group Production, David Powels, Managing Director of Volkswagen of South Africa, and Peter Conze, Head of the South Africa Office of Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ), were also present in Uitenhage.

Another new CSR project involves three soccer buses. The Volkswagen Crafter will be traveling round Eastern Cape Province, giving children the chance to engage in sports and combining this with Aids prevention. The buses and their specialist teams will travel to over 100 schools, primarily in rural areas, and organize soccer training for boys and girls. These training sessions will also teach the young people through play about how to prevent Aids, avoid violence and strengthen social skills. The programs will initially run until 2012 and will reach over 30,000 young people during this period. This is a cooperation project between Volkswagen, GTZ and the “A chance to play” social project initiated by the Volkswagen Group Works Council.

In addition, plans to build a new pre-school for over 100 children were also announced on Friday. Building work on the pre-school in KwaLanga, one of the poorest districts in Uitenhage, will commence in mid-June. The Volkswagen Community Trust is contributing €360,000 to the project. A further €90,000 is being donated by Volkswagen of South Africa employees under their “One hour for the future” initiative. The Nelson Mandela Bay local authorities are providing the land. The pre-school will be called “Ikhwezi Lomso”, which means “morning star”.

These three new projects underscore Volkswagen’s long-standing social commitment in South Africa. Over the last 20 years, Volkswagen of South Africa’s Community Trust alone has invested more than €5.5 million in the region surrounding Port Elizabeth. About the Volkswagen Community Trust:

The Volkswagen Community Trust was founded more than 20 years ago. The aim of the Trust is to support the community in Nelson Mandela Bay – the region where the employees of Volkswagen of South Africa and their families live and work. The Trust is jointly administered by representatives from the trade unions, communal authorities, management and workforce of Volkswagen of South Africa.