Toyota helps taxi industry curb Covid-19 with 65,000 litres of sanitiser

Toyota South Africa Motors (TSAM) is spending more than R10m to assist the local taxi industry in the fight against the spread of Covid-19. The assistance comes in the form of more than 65,000 litres of sanitiser, 2,000 handwash dispensers and Covid-19-related marketing initiatives.

“Toyota had already committed to these taxi support initiatives when the government introduced national lockdown regulations in March,” said the company's senior vice-president of sales and marketing, Leon Theron.

"We are pleased to have been able to flight, distribute and publish some of the marketing and educational material in the beginning of the lockdown when most South Africans were still coming to grips with what the coronavirus is.”

Some of the elements that were executed at the beginning of lockdown include Covid-19 educational billboards at some taxi ranks as well as a commuter safety animation video that started flighting on April 3. TSAM also created posters, flyers, vehicle decals and T-shirts that are being distributed to various taxi associations.

With regards to sanitisers, Toyota confirmed that a total of 2,000 x 25 litre, 3,000 x 5 litre, 20,000 x 100ml, and 2,000 handwash dispensers had 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 (from 5am to 7pm) – up four hours from Level 5 regulations. Loading capacity for minibus taxis remains at 70% of licensed 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,” Theron concluded.