TORONTO - Despite the grim news of the Big Three closing plants and laying off staff, Japanese automakers in Ontario are quietly creating jobs and expanding their operations.
Honda has a plant in Alliston, near Barrie, where it builds Civics and Acuras on two shifts with a capacity of 390,000 units a year.
They plan on expanding their production later this year.
Toyota has a Corolla, Matrix and Lexus plant in Cambridge that employs 5,000 people with a capacity of 300,000 units.
It's opening a plant in Woodstock this year, where it will build the RAV 4 and employ 2,000 workers.
Ingersoll is home to CAMI Automotive, a Suzuki-GM Canada joint venture with 2,600 workers and 260,000 units a year.
The companies are building the fuel efficient, smaller vehicles that are very popular in the face of soaring gas prices.
Joseph D'Cruz, a professor at the University of Toronto, says Honda, Suzuki and Toyota are doing better in part because they have a non-unionized and younger workforce and they pay less.
But CAW economist Jim Stanford says it is not true that they are creating a non-union job for every one that disappears.
He says that even counting the new jobs at Honda and Toyota, the Canadian auto industry has still lost 30,000 jobs since 2001.
