Whirlpool workers will hold a general strike and protest rally on 12 June over the US white goods group's plan to fire nearly one-third of its staff in Italy, unions said Friday.
"We need to mobilise the whole Whirlpool group to prevent redundancies and plant closures," the Fim, Fiom and Uilm unions said in statement.
The statement called for a major industrial and investment plan for Whirlpool in Italy.
Workers in the southern Italian city of Caserta in the Campania region on Friday held a general strike over Whirlpool's plan to close four Italian plants including Caserta and to fire around 2,000 people.
The general strike on 13 June will last eight hours and a protest march will take place in the northern city of Varese against the job cuts, which Italy's industry minster branded "disgraceful" on Wednesday.
Industry minister Federica Guidi said Wednesday she was disappointed by the outcome of government-brokered talks between Whirlpool and Italian labour unions of the past month over the US multinational's restructuring plan.
The negotiations will only continue when Whirlpool presents "credible and tangible" proposals that give guarantees to workers, Guidi said.
One of the Italian factories Whirlpool plans to close is its Caserta plant, which employs 815 people. A large chunk of the redundances will hit Italy's poorer south, where unemployment remains high.
Whirlpool on Wednesday announced it would cut an extra 480 jobs on top of the 1,350 redundancies it announced in April after taking over its smaller Italian rival Indesit in December.
All all the cuts to Whirlpool's current Italian workforce of 6,700 are due to be made by 2018.
