Toyota assists taxi industry in COVID-19 preparedness

Toyota South Africa Motors (TSAM) has announced that it will be spending R10 million to assist the local taxi industry amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The money will go towards over 65 000 litres of sanitiser, 2 000 face masks and various marketing initiatives.

According to TSAM’s Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing Leon Theron: “Toyota had already committed to these taxi support initiatives when the government introduced national lockdown regulations in March. We are pleased to have been able to flight, distribute and publish some of the marketing and educational material at the beginning of the lockdown when most South Africans were still coming to grips with what the Coronavirus is.”

With regards to sanitisers, TSAM confirms that a total of 2 000 x 25 litres, 3 000 x 5 litres, 20 000 x 100ml, as well as 2 000 hand-wash dispensers have been distributed to regional taxi structures across the country’s nine provinces.

Under lockdown Level 4 regulations, minibus taxis can now operate for 12 hours (5 am–7 pm) – up 4 hours from Level 5 regulations. Loading capacity for minibus taxis remains at 70% of licenced passengers, with social distancing and other mitigating measures remaining in place.

“While current lockdown regulations may offer a glimmer of hope into life as we once knew it, at Toyota we believe that we need to intensify our fight against COVID-19 as we now have more commuters using public transport – compared to lockdown Level 5 when we only had essential service personnel operating.

“We trust that our support with the distribution of sanitisers to the taxi industry will go a long way in terms of mitigating the rate of Coronavirus infections in the local public transport system,” concludes Theron.