Recently, the first vehicle rolled off the production line at BYD’s factory in Camaçari, Bahia, Brazil. According to Baldi, Senior Vice President of BYD Brazil, the new plant will soon start its production line and aims to assemble 50,000 vehicles this year. He stated that in the upcoming year, the new plant will use complete knock-down (CKD) assembly for vehicle production, and is expected to start full-scale operations by July next year.
BYD announced the construction of its new plant in Camaçari in July 2023, with a total investment of 5.5 billion reais (4.19 billion ringgit). The plant is a large manufacturing complex comprised of three factories. The vehicle production line will manufacture both pure electric and plug-in hybrid models, with a planned annual production capacity of 150,000 vehicles.
However, the plant project has faced controversy. In December last year, Brazil’s Ministry of Labor and other departments conducted a surprise inspection at the plant’s construction site, finding that about 163 Chinese construction workers were living and working in poor conditions. In May this year, the Brazilian Ministry of Labor filed a lawsuit against BYD, accusing it of involvement in human trafficking and other issues during the construction of the Camaçari plant, and is seeking to hold the company legally responsible.
Nevertheless, this has not affected the production plans for the new BYD plant in Brazil. In a recent interview with foreign media, Baldi stated that the new plant will use imported components and aims to assemble 50,000 vehicles this year while seeking lower car tax rates from the Brazilian government. Baldi also added that they completed all vehicle imports for this year before the import tariffs were increased on July 1. According to foreign media reports, BYD increased its export of complete vehicles to Brazil while tariffs were temporarily low, importing about 22,000 vehicles from China in the first five months of this year.
BYD began operations in Brazil in 2014, establishing factories in Campinas and Manaus starting from 2015. In 2021, BYD entered the Brazilian passenger vehicle market, and in 2024, its annual sales exceeded 76,000 vehicles, a sharp increase of 328%. In the first five months of this year, BYD’s sales in Brazil surpassed 39,000 vehicles, with pure electric vehicles accounting for 92.2% of this figure and plug-in hybrids accounting for 35.8% in the local market.