【英语科技】印度汽车城金奈：东方的底特律

This Indian port city, built around a former British fort, in many ways resembles Detroit circa 1910.

The metropolis of about five million people is booming as scores of international car makers and suppliers have set up shop. Ford Motor Co., Hyundai Motor Co, Nissan Motor Co., Renault SA, Daimler AG and BMW AG all have converged here.

They are spending billions of dollars to make Chennai one of the world's biggest hubs of small cars for export as well as for increasingly affluent Indians. Soon, the city will turn out close to 1.5 million autos a year, more than any one U.S. state made last year.

Car-parts suppliers also are placing big bets on the city, formerly known as Madras. Tire company Michelin SA and window maker Saint-Gobain SA, both of France, are setting up some of their biggest factories globally in Chennai. Germany's Daimler, meantime, is building a multimillion-dollar test track.

All the investment has generated jobs for more than 200,000 people and accounts for 12% of the economic output of the state of Tamil Nadu.

The kind of manufacturing being done in Chennai is what India needs to bridge the gap between its agricultural work force, which makes up 60% of its population, and high-end services industries, such as outsourcing, that employ relatively few.

Unlike China, India hasn't been able to attract as many foreign investors to set up factories because of bureaucratic barriers and volatile politics. But Chennai's boom is a sign that India can create a productive environment when economic circumstances are right and demand is there. India's economy is expected to grow 9% this year and Tamil Nadu has worked to minimize barriers to investment.

Hyundai has invested $2 billion here, and recently expanded to be able to produce 650,000 cars a year. It is not only cheap factory-floor labor that attracted the South Korean company, but also an abundance of low-wage engineers to program the robots that help churn out vehicles.

On the other side of town, Ford has invested close to $1 billion, deploying production-line technology it doesn't even use in the U.S., including car-painting robots and a deep-water testing pool to ensure cars won't leak during monsoon floods.

Michael Boneham, the Chennai-based managing director of Ford's India operations, said the educated labor, a consistent industrial policy, access to a port and government financial incentives all played a role in luring the U.S. car maker to the city.

'India is now on the radar as one of the two most important markets for Ford strategically world-wide,' the other being China, Mr. Boneham said.

Ford, among the first foreign firms here, recently announced its best-ever quarter in India: Sales more than tripled in the second quarter compared to a year earlier to 22,858 vehicles thanks to its recently expanded Chennai facilities.

The state of Tamil Nadu has been better than most Indian jurisdictions at providing the land, roads and electricity that the car industry needs. It also set up a single office for them to obtain the dozens of government approvals and licenses required to start or expand a business.

The growth of the car industry hasn't been without problems. Hyundai unions have staged several strikes to demand better treatment of workers, traffic has become more congested and rents in some of the best neighborhoods are now out of reach of the average Indian.

But Chennai's production capacity is set to rise even further. Japan's Nissan just started making cars here in May after investing close to $1 billion, and it plans to ramp up to more than 400,000 cars a year. Its Indian-made subcompact, the Micra, will hit global roads in October.

围绕一个前英国要塞而建的印度港口城市金奈(Chennai)，在很多方面都像是1910年前后的底特律。

Reuters汽车制造商都在金奈组装汽车。图为金奈港口。随着众多国际汽车生产商和供应商设厂开店，这座人口约500万的大都市正在日益膨胀。福特(Ford Motor Co.)、现代(Hyundai Motor Co)、日产(Nissan Motor Co.)、雷诺(Renault SA)、戴姆勒(Daimler AG)和宝马(BMW AG)都已在这里会合。

它们正在大量投资，将把金奈建成世界最大的小排量汽车生产基地之一，这些汽车或用于出口，或卖给越来越富裕的印度人。不久，金奈就会达到每年近150万辆汽车的产量，超过去年美国任何一个州。

汽车零部件供应商也在这个原名“马德拉斯”(Madras)的城市身上押下了重注。都来自法国的轮胎公司米其林(Michelin SA)和车窗生产商Saint-Gobain SA，正在金奈修建规模在全世界都十分靠前的工厂。而德国的戴姆勒也在花数百万美元修建一条试验车道。

这一切投资为20多万人创造了就业，在泰米尔纳德邦（Tamil Nadu）的经济产值当中占12%。

在印度，农业劳动力占总人口的60%，而外包等高端服务业雇佣的人数相对较少，要填补两者之间的空白，金奈的这些制造业就成为了必需。

和中国不一样，印度由于它的官僚作风和动荡政局，没有能够吸引那么多的外国投资者前来开设工厂。但金奈的繁荣说明，当经济氛围适当、需求不缺的时候，印度是可以创造出一种高效的环境的。预计今年印度经济将增长9%，而泰米尔纳德邦也为降低投资障碍而做了努力。

现代汽车已在金奈投资20亿美元，最近又进行了扩张，年产能将达到65万辆。吸引这家韩资企业的不仅是廉价的一线劳动力，同样还有大量拿着低工资、为辅助汽车生产的机器人编程的工程师。

在金奈的另一个地方，福特已投资接近10亿美元，部署了一些在美国都没有使用的生产技术，其中有给汽车喷漆的机器人，和一个确保汽车不会在雨季中漏水的深水验车池。

福特印度公司常驻金奈的董事总经理Michael Boneham说，劳动者文化高、产业政策稳定、临近港口、政府提供财务优惠，都是吸引这家美国汽车生产商来到金奈的原因。

Boneham说，现在印度是福特在全世界具有战略性重要地位的两个市场之一，受到福特的密切关注。另一个市场是中国。

福特和其他第一批来到这里的外资公司一样，也在近期宣布取得了它在印度的史上最好季度业绩：由于在近期扩大了位于金奈的设施，福特在第二季度的销量达到22,858辆，是一年前的三倍多。

泰米尔纳德邦在提供汽车工业所需的土地、道路和电能方面，一直好于印度的多数地区。该邦还为汽车厂商专门设立了一个办公室，为它们申请开办或扩大一个企业所需的政府审批和许可，通常多达数十种。

金奈汽车工业的成长也不是一帆风顺。现代汽车（Hyundai）的子公司已经发生多起要求改善工人待遇的罢工，交通已经变得更加拥堵，一些最好社区的房租现在也达到了印度普通人难以企及的水平。

但金奈的产能看来还要进一步增加。日产公司投资近10亿美元后，5月份才刚刚开始在这里生产汽车，而且还计划把年产量提高到40多万辆。该公司在印度生产的超小型汽车Micra将在10月份跑上全世界的道路。