Alcoa will close at least two factories in Spain and leave 700 jobs in the air

Alcoa will close at least two factories in Spain and leave 700 jobs in the air

The Government says it had no news and asks for more information from the company, while the Galician and Asturian Executives - where the plants are - will coordinate their response

  Up to 700 jobs are on the air due to the closure of two of the three factories that the US aluminum multinational Alcoa has in Spain - after 1989, with the nine that the former National Aluminum Company had (Endasa) -, advanced on Tuesday to the representatives of the works council at European level. These are the plants located in Áviles (Asturias) and A Coruña (Galicia), with 317 and 369 employees, respectively, almost one third of the workforce of nearly 2,000 people the group has in Spain, where the year past invoiced 3,303 million dollars (2,861 million euros), more than a quarter (28%) of its business around the world.

  The argument given by the company to justify such a drastic measure is that both factories are the least productive of their international list of assets due to the "structural problems" they have been enduring for a long time, both of a productive nature - both take out 180,000 metric tons year of primary aluminum - as a technological one due to its low efficiency and high costs. In fact, he came to carry out several internal and external analyzes, whose conclusions show that the best organizational solution would be to close them and group all his work in the San Ciprián factory in Lugo, the largest he has in the country with 1,300 employees focused on producing aluminum. and alumina, a fundamental oxide for making clays and enamels.

From Alcoa argue that they have tried to make "efforts in recent years" to change these conditions and even probed their sale two years ago -in 2014 they also raised the option to close them-, but finally the possible stakeholders -the Spanish company Alibérico , the German group Trimet and the investment fund Atlas (which through the firm Aludim already has two aluminum factories in Alicante and Vizcaya, precisely acquired from Alcoa) - withdrew from the operation because it did not provide sufficient profitability. The unions, despite this, insist that alternatives be sought before closure - the company offers a social plan for the relocation of workers - and they study what response measures to carry out, without ruling out work stoppages.

The next step of the US group will be to open the mandatory period of 30 days of consultations with the workers' representatives and summon them to a negotiating table, although they have already told them that they are against the closure, considering that the two factories threatened "Yes, they can be viable." They hope, nevertheless, that the company will give them in the coming days the specific information on which they base their decision, and for which they point out other factors external factors of the international aluminum market, for example, the overproduction of China, the high price of raw materials and a clearly rising energy cost.

On this last point from Alcoa point out that the energy bill already accounts for 40% of their production costs and does not stop growing. In this sense, in recent years it has been demanding an improvement in the electricity interruption auction system, a tool that allows companies to obtain a remuneration in exchange for disconnecting from the network for a specific period of time in case of need due to high demand. Precisely for this reason the president of the Xunta de Galicia, Alberto Núñez Feijó, now demands that the Government "move concrete proposals" to "reverse an unfair situation", while asking for more details to the company.


Protests in A Coruña

One step further has gone the president of the Principality of Asturias, Javier Fernández, who has asked Alcoa directly not to materialize the closures. Through his counselor for Employment, Industry and Tourism, Isaac Pola, announced that he plans to call a company and unions to a tripartite meeting, in addition to opening a joint action front with the Galician Executive, a measure also proposed by Núñez Feijó. Meanwhile, the workers of the Alcoa plant have already started the first impromptu mobilizations this morning, preventing trucks from leaving with material and concentrating at the doors of the facilities, although they do continue with the production.

The government, for its part, showed its "surprise and concern" at the decision of the multinational since, during the contacts maintained in the last three months, "had never reported that could take a unilateral decision in this regard," says in a note the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism. For the moment, he has asked for more information and to look for "alternatives" to maintain the productive capacity of the Avilés and A Coruña plants. To this end, the central executive "will work together with the other affected public administrations and social agents".