Cat's Gosselies will cease production. PHOTO: GOOGLE

By Luc de Smet
Caterpillar has announced its intention to shut its plant in Gosselies (Charleroi, Belgium). The measure follows last year's announcement that Caterpillar would cut some 10,000 jobs worldwide to increase profitability.

The Gosselies plant is too big and uneconomic for current demand and its output could be built cheaper elsewhere. As yet, no figures have been released on the factory's production, productivity or profitability.

At Gosselies, 2,200 direct jobs would be lost in collective lay-offs. It is feared that the closing will also affect between 3,600 and 6,000 jobs at suppliers.

The factory will continue production until April 2017.

The Gosselies production of loaders and spare parts may be picked up by Caterpillar's French plants, keeping production in Europe, but some of the lines, such as excavators, could also move to America, Japan and/or China.

First, however, an information and consultation process with the government and trade unions will begin.

Talks will also commence with employees at Cediwal sprl, a CAT subsidiary with sites at Fleurus and Gosselies, which supplies the Gosselies plant with subassemblies. This follows the closure last year of the Cediwal site of Heppignies that produced tools for excavators and bulldozers, where 57 jobs were lost.

The first wheel loaders left the Caterpillar plant in Gosselies in 1967. Hydraulic excavators followed. At peak production, some 800 machines a month rolled off the lines.

In February 2013, Caterpillar shed 1,400 of its 3,600 employees at Gosselies. The production of its smaller machines moved to Grenoble (France) and Japan, and the plant focused on construction equipment, especially the largest Tier 4 machines. This change proved to be insufficient to keep the production line running full-time and the company made use of temporary unemployment schemes.

Caterpillar's European distribution centre in Grimbergen remains operational. The used equipment wholesale centre that opened in Zeebrugge in 2011 will also remain. Its storage and repair centre for used earthmoving equipment is under the control of Cat Logistics Services and serviced by Van der Vlist Belgium.