Tire production at Continental Barum increased slightly this week, but output is still a far cry from what it was before the coronavirus outbreak. Idnes.cz reports that the company began running into trouble at the end of March when Europe’s biggest automobile manufacturers began shutting down plants. The biggest employer in the Zlin region of the Czech Republic was forced to shut down altogether for several days, but management says the situation is at least improving slowly now. Truck tire output is currently running at 80 percent, but tire production is still stuck at 30 percent of capacity. “Output goes up every week, but we’re still just dealing with short-term views of a week ahead,” said Barum’s spokeswoman Regina Fieferlikova. “Production is ramping up depending on customer demand.” The company has opened just two of its three Czech plants, none of which even opened last weekend because of the lack of orders.
