Crossing the Blues

Peugeot Hoggar reminds us of the Proton Arena!


Remember Proton’s Wira based Arena “pick-up truck”? I still see some pasar malam traders putting the Arena to good use and it has carved out a niche for itself in Australia, where it’s called Jumbuck. Here’s one car with a similar concept from Peugeot, and it’s called the Hoggar.


The Hoggar is made for the South American market, and is based on the domestic 207. However, the 207 in question is not the same car that competes in Europe’s supermini class, but a 206 with a changed cabin and redesigned to look like the “big mouthed” 207. The Hoggar has a payload of about 742 kg.


Peugeot’s small pick-up will be launched in Brazil in May and will come with two engine options: a 1.4-litre and a 1.6-litre, both with flex-fuel technology. Flex-fuel cars can run on gasoline, ethanol or a mixture of the two. In Brazil, ethanol made mostly from sugar cane makes up 25% of the E25 fuel that’s sold in pumps. By the way, what happened to Malaysia’s biodiesel plans? Anybody in the know?