Production at South Africa's seven new vehicle manufacturing plants is expected to slowly return to normal this week after a deal was struck on Friday to end a 17-day strike at parts suppliers.
The agreement, signed at the motor industry bargaining council, will end a strike in the motor retail, automotive component manufacturing and fuel retail sectors.
BMW South Africa spokesman Guy Kilfoil said its plant had produced cars on Thursday and Friday after some suppliers "pulled out all the stops for us". BMW SA hoped to resume normal production today though there were still some risks in the parts supply system.
Kilfoil said the two strikes in the vehicle manufacturing and automotive component manufacturing sectors had cost BMW SA more than 4 000 cars in lost production.
Mercedes-Benz South Africa spokeswoman Annelise van der Laan said on Friday parts were starting to flow into its East London plant, which was scheduled to be open at the weekend.
Most plants were expected to be fully operational this week.
Bill Stephens, a Volkswagen South Africa spokesman, said the firm had been unable to open its plant. The firm hoped to resume production this week.
Leo Kok, a spokesman for Toyota South Africa, said it had lost 10 000 units in production because of the strike.
The company would be unable to catch up lost production until the first quarter of next year. It had already used all the available overtime and weekends to recoup production lost during the industry's own strike and the Transnet strike.
In terms of the agreement signed with National Union of Metalworkers of SA, wages of workers in the component manufacturing sector will increase by 9 percent in the first year and 8 percent in each of the following two years.
Fuel service station workers will get a 10 percent wage hike in the first year and 9 percent in the next two years of the agreement. The remainder of the retail motor industry will get wage increases of 9 percent in the first year, 8 percent in the second year and 7 percent in the third year.