St. Thomas/IBNS: A historic investment of $7 billion from Volkswagen, Europe’s largest automaker, was secured last month by Ontario in Canada, to establish its first overseas electric vehicle battery manufacturing plant in St. Thomas, a news release has said.

The plant with six production blocks on a 370-acre site inside a new 1,500-acre industrial park on land St. Thomas was purchased just for this purpose last year.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford and Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau were joined by Ontario’s Minister of Economic Development Vic Fedeli and the federal Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, François-Philippe Champagne, to highlight the deal for Ontario and Canada’s entire electric vehicle supply chain.

Once complete in 2027, batteries for up to one million electric vehicles per year would reportedly be produced to meet the demand of Canada’s domestic battery manufacturing capacity for electric vehicles now and into the future.

This first largest electric vehicle-related investment in Canadian history would reportedly benefit Ontario and Canada’s highly-skilled workers, strong economies, and competitive business environments in creating up to 3,000 direct jobs and up to 30,000 indirect jobs.

Construction of this largest manufacturing plant in Canada expected to begin next year will reportedly generate about $200 billion in value.

(Reporting by Asha Bajaj)