MEXICO CITY: France's Safran, the world's third-largest aerospace supplier, has began building a new factory in the northern Mexican border state of Chihuahua, Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard said on Saturday.

Ebrard said on Twitter that he was informed on July 1 that Safran "begins construction of a plant in Chihuahua to manufacture the interiors of Boeing passenger planes, employing more than 800 people!"

Safran, which has two plants in the Mexican industrial city of Queretaro, did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.

Safran in May announced it had laid off 3,000 employees in Mexico amid an unprecedented crisis in the aerospace industry stemming from the coronavirus pandemic.