Michelin’s Chennai training centre gets underway
On July 15 the very first course will commence at the new Michelin Training Centre at the tyre maker’s Chennai site. The centre, which officially opened on May 30, has been set up to improve the employability of people in the local area; the first course held there will impart English language skills, and other courses, including computer skills, accounting and vocational programmes, are already planned. The Michelin Training Centre is located within the Thervoy Kandigai Industrial Park in Chennai’s Thiruvallur district, where the Michelin is investing Rs 40 billion (£560 million) in a truck and bus tyre facility.
“Michelin firmly believes that the company will do well only when the communities around its operations can also benefit,” stated Nicolas Beaumont, managing director of Michelin India Tamil Nadu Tyres Pvt. Ltd. “The main focus of this training facility is to offer training to both: Michelin employees and the local community around the site. Apart from technical and language training to its own staff, the facility will conduct training in soft and technical skills to help improve employment opportunities of the villagers, in general.”
The factory itself, currently under construction on the 117 hectare site, will eventually employ some 1,500 people from the local area. Michelin has already hired 356 employees for the Chennai facility and training is now underway for two-thirds of this group; the French manufacturer hosts training programmes in various overseas factories over one to three-year period, thereby providing its employees with international experience.
“The first radial truck tyre from the manufacturing facility will be rolled out in November 2012,” Beaumont continued. “The plant has a capacity to produce 20 lakh (2,000,000) tyres however, in the first year; we will produce 3 lakh (300,000) tyres. With this facility in India, Michelin will be better equipped to cater to evolving and increasing needs of the Indian customer.”
In a company statement on the Chennai plant’s progress, Michelin also affirms it “understands that industrialisation should not be at the cost of traditional mainstays of agriculture and animal husbandry.” Therefore the tyre maker says it has committed itself to “making a positive contribution to the neighbouring communities around where it will operate by supporting a wide range of socio-economic, educational and health initiatives, always in consultation with villages.” To this end, Michelin has devised a mid to long-term corporate social responsibility strategy based upon a socio-economic survey conducted by FORRAD (the Foundation for Rural Recovery and Development) in 31 villages near the Chennai site. This strategy includes Michelin’s sponsorship of health camps to cover paediatrics, gynaecology, general health care and eye care. Michelin has also committed itself to improving infrastructure in local hospitals and health care centres and, last but not least, is supporting local agriculture through a project to de-silt irrigation channels within the region.
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