SA regulators permitting sale of vehicles with lower safety standards

Toyota’s Prospecton plant in Durban manufactures the Corolla Cross. The AA says local manufacturers tend to rely on the minimum standards rather than improving safety features. Picture: Supplied Vehicles with inferior safety protection features compared to those in all other major global markets are being permitted to be sold into the South African market because of the compulsory safety standards set by the country’s regulators.

This is the implication of the responses from both Toyota South Africa Motors (TSAM) and Hyundai South Africa to the latest #SaferCarsForAfrica campaign crash test results from Global NCAP (New Car Assessment Programme). In the tests, the Toyota Corolla Cross received a two-star rating for adult occupant protection due to the absence of standard side head protection, while the Hyundai Grand i10 received a zero-star rating because it offers only basic safety equipment such as driver and passenger airbags, and does not come standard with side body or head protection, nor does it include Electronic Stability Control (ESC). Toyota confirmed the locally manufactured Corolla Cross “meets and exceeds all applicable local legislative safety requirements”.

Hyundai said the Grand i10 meets all the safety and homologation requirements applicable in South Africa, as stipulated by the National Regulator for Compulsory Specifications (NRCS). The South African Bureau of Standards (SABS) and the NRCS are responsible for developing, maintaining and enforcing compulsory specifications, including mandatory safety standards. Moneyweb sent a list of questions to both entities on Friday, but no response has yet been received.

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Automobile Association (AA) CEO Bobby Ramagwede told Moneyweb in an exclusive interview that the #SaferCarsForAfrica Global NCAP programme has been going for 17 years and, despite the safety-features issues revealed by crash tests on a variety of models of various vehicle brands, “not even a punctuation mark has changed” in the compulsory safety standards for motor vehicles. Ramagwede added there has been “zero engagement” between the regulators and the AA about the results of the vehicle crash tests. “And with the original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) knowing this, they can continue resting on the minimum standard.

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