VOLKSWAGEN South Africa has achieved an African first with the manufacture of its 100 000th Golf 4 for export. The car, a silver, left-hand drive Golf 4, was produced at the company’s plant in Uitenhage, which is part of the Nelson Mandela Metro. This is the highest number of exports for any model from Africa, and brings to more than 136 000 the number of vehicles produced for export by Volkswagen South Africa over the past decade. These include 27 720 Jetta 2s to China, 500 Audi A4s to Australia and 8 000 Golf 3s to the United Kingdom. The company is the leading vehicle exporter from the African continent. According to Volkswagen South Africa's Managing Director Hans-Christian Maergner, the Golf 4 export programme has generated billions of Rand in foreign exchange earnings for the country. It has also shown the world that the Eastern Cape is capable of producing top quality products on time and at a competitive price. "Apart from the foreign exchange earnings, the Golf 4 export programme has been particularly significant as it has enabled Volkswagen to move very quickly from a local manufacturer to a global operator," said Mr Maergner. "By proving that we can fulfil vehicle orders for overseas countries, on time and to the right quality levels, we have been given the opportunity to be part of the global vehicle and component supply network of the Volkswagen Group where we benefit from skills and technology transfers.” According to Maergner, around 30 000 cars should be exported by VWSA this year. "It has been achieved through a lot of hard work and ability to adapt to change on behalf of our employees - both management and workers - and the sharing of a common vision with our external stakeholders, including dealers, suppliers and customers. It's also knowing that Volkswagen has in fact made a major contribution in the export field whilst others are still talking about it.” Component exports from the Eastern Cape and elsewhere in South Africa are benefiting from the company’s success. Maergner says the company increased its focus on its component exports to Audi and VW plants this year. "We have substantially grown this area within the Volkswagen Group over the past 12 months with component exports rising from R900 million to R1,5 billion turnover per annum. It includes a wide range of catalytic converters, alloy wheels, driveshafts, rubber-metal parts and engine components, amongst others, to manufacturing plants in North and Central America, Europe and Asia. Over the past three months we have announced major component export orders to the value of R4,2 billion. These component orders are for the life cycle of the relevant Audi or Volkswagen product. Our export strategy is closely aligned to the objectives of the Motor Industry Development Programme (MIDP) - and it has enabled the company to import a wide range of latest generation Volkswagen and Audi products from within the VW Group. We are currently hard at work on our future vision of securing an additional export contract to be the platform supplier for the next generation of VW cars within the group." Volkswagen of South Africa, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Volkswagen AG of Germany, is based in Uitenhage where it assembles Volkswagen CitiGolf, Polo Playa, Polo Classic, Golf 4, Jetta 4 and T3 Microbus vehicles. It also imports a large range of Volkswagen and Audi vehicles. It is the largest seller of passenger vehicles in South Africa and expects to build more than 75 000 vehicles for local and overseas markets this year. More than 5 300 people are employed at the facility that includes a Press Shop and Engine Manufacturing section. The company will also export components to the value of R1,5 billion this year. It has been re-accredited with the ISO 9001 and VDA 6.1 quality management systems this year. It also complies with the ISO 14000 environmental management system.