Mazda president
Mark Fields said Tuesday that executives within the company will take a 10 percent
pay cut in response to 1,800 workers being asked to take early retirement next
month, writes Associated Press.
Mr. Fields said that the pay cuts were designed to show that senior managers
were doing their part “in taking painful action as the rest of our company.”
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AP said that previous attempts at cutting jobs were not effective because employees
did not volunteer to quit. Hisakazu Imaki, senior managing director responsible
for overseeing business logistics, said that this time several hundred workers
have already agreed to retire.
Talking to reporters invited to see models deing developed at Mazda’s Yokohama
research facility near Tokyo, Mr. Fields did not say what would be done if workers
did not volunteer to retire.
Last year, the Hiroshima-based company, 33.4 percent owned by Ford, cut its
22,000 workforce by 8 percent with voluntary retirement by white-collar employees.
AP says that it is unclear if Mazda’s goal of shedding 1,800 staff could be
achieved as generally in Japan no worker can be forced to quit.
Mazda is also planning to market fuel-cell powered versions of almost all existing
models around 2005, company executives said.
However, Mr. Fumiaki Inami, director in charge of product planning, said that
the number of fuel-cell cars to be marketed initially will likely be very limited.
