End of an era for Romania's iconic yet oft-derided Dacia car

(22 Jul 2004)

Bucharest, 20 July
1. Various of Dacia showroom
2. Various of Dacia cars on Romanian roads
3. Group of Romanians around broken Dacia trying to fix engine
4. SOUNDBITE (romanian) voxpop:
"If you have this car it's impossible to be stopped for long. Everybody can fix it and you go on."
5. Various of Dacias modified to be ambulances
6. Various of Dacia police car
7. Dacia on road
8. Dacia carrying market produce
9. Dacia truck with pigs in the back
10. Dacia truck with vegetables in the back

Pitesti, 120km (80 miles) north of Bucharest - 21 July 2004
Renault - Dacia factory
11. Various of assembly line
12. Pan from Renault Logan to Dacia truck
13. Last Dacia coming off assembly line, "1959 - 2004" and total number produced written on bonnet, "last car" written on side in Romanian
14. SOUNDBITE: (Romanian) Girjeu, Dacia car engineer:
"I feel deep emotion because I worked on the first car 45 years ago and now I have made the last car."
15. Manager signing car
16. People around car
17. Last car and new Renault Logan side by side outside factory

STORYLINE:

A period of Romanian history came to an end on Wednesday with production of the last ever Dacia 1300 car.

The last car, the 1,959,730th vehicle to be produced by the French-owned company, rolled off the assembly line on Wednesday.

The last traditional Dacia to be manufactured by Automobile Dacia Groupe Renault was a white Dacia 1300, a replica of the Renault 12.

Renault forged a partnership with Automobile Dacia in 1968 during a thaw in communism, in an era when the average Romanian began to aspire to own a car.

In 1969, production of the Dacia 1300 began. Romania shook off communism in 1989, and a decade later, Renault bought a 99.43 percent stake in the company.

The car provokes mixed sentiments in Romania where it is maligned because it breaks down so often, yet oddly iconic.

Factory workers and company officials scrawled their signatures on the car and a worker drove it out of the factory, and parked it in the yard.

The last Dacia will probably be donated to a museum, a fitting end to a car which is equated with the birth of the modern automobile industry in Romania.

The final 200 Dacias were sold on Tuesday.

The car, which used to cost 70,000 lei, three years at the average salary, had a waiting list of two years. It now costs 4,200 lei (5,040 US dollars), the equivalent of 28 months of the average salary, and there is no waiting list.

The company will now produce the new Renault Logan car, which will be exported to the Middle East Russia, and Eastern Europe and goes on sale in September. The company will continue to produce the newer Dacia Solenza, and Dacia utility vehicles.

Dacia Groupe Renault says there are still an estimated 1.5 (M) million Dacias in the country of 22 (M) million people.

Statistics mean little to many Romanians, who often give their cars pet names and practically consider them part of the family.

But even those fortunate enough to acquire one had a tough time enjoying it:

The late dictator Nicolae Ceausescu rationed gasoline, and the driving of cars was restricted on Sundays. Cars were allowed on the roads on alternate Sundays, depending on their license plate numbers.

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