BEIJING: General Motors said yesterday that it had asked its main Chinese supplier to find an alternative source of components after an explosion ripped through a factory a day earlier killing at least 69 people.
The accident at the Zhongrong Metal Products Co Ltd plant in Kunshan city in the eastern province of Jiangsu was China’s worst industrial accident in a year.
Aside from the fatalities, some 200 people were injured in the blast, state-run Xinhua news agency reported, raising its casualty estimate from overnight.
According to Zhongrong’s website, the factory made wheels that are supplied to GM and many other carmakers.
Distancing itself from Zhongrong, the Detroit automaker issued a statement saying it bought components from a company called “Dicastal” — which Zhongrong works with.
GM went onto say it had no direct dealings with Zhongrong, which it described as a “Tier-2” supplier. Tier-1 component suppliers such as Dicastal are “required to source from Tier-2 suppliers who must meet both in-country environment and safety standards as well as quality standards,” GM said.
The US automaker noted that Saturday’s accident did not cause any immediate impact on its production because it has “sufficient inventory” of the parts, without specifying what the components were. “We are working with our supplier to establish alternate processing capability,” the statement said.
The GM statement said it was “too early to determine the cause of the explosion” as an official investigation was underway.
Reuters
