Fiat's Iveco truck unit to cut 1,000 jobs in Spain

MILAN, April 26 (Reuters) - Fiat's Iveco unit plans to cut about 1,000 jobs at a plant in Spain to reduce costs in the face of a severe sales slump, a spokesman for the truck division said on Sunday.

Iveco will cut the jobs at a plant in Madrid, one of three it has in the country, he said.

Plant chief Piero Bordesan was quoted in Italian business daily Il Sole 24 Ore on Sunday as saying that the number of jobs to be cut was less than half of the roughly 2,800 workers at the plant, which makes trucks for transport and construction.

Bordesan said the other workers would be off work for extended periods of time throughout the rest of the year to keep operating costs down.

The global economic crisis has hurt sales so much that the plant is making 28 units a day rather than the usual 110, he said.

Like other industrial groups, Fiat has been cutting costs in all of its divisions.

To cope with falling output, Fiat Auto, which produces Fiat, Lancia and Alfa Romeo cars, closes its plants in Italy for weeks at a time and sends workers home with reduced pay. (Reporting by Gilles Castonguay; editing by Karen Foster)