Maritime cluster to ‘make Durban great again’

AN ACTION plan is under way to make “Durban great again” in marine manufacturing.

“We need to go to the African markets and the rest of the world to market South Africa under Team SA,” said Prasheen Maharaj at the end of the two-day annual Maritime Summit organised by the eThekwini Maritime Cluster.

“If we want to make Durban and South Africa great again, we have to hunt in packs,” said Maharaj, chairman of the cluster’s marine manufacturing sub-committee and chief executive of Southern African Shipyards.

Thato Tsautse, managing director of the eThekwini Maritime Cluster, said Team SA, comprising ship-building and ship-repair industry representatives, would set out on an international marketing drive this year.

Delegates heard earlier that the industry was in decline compared with the 1980s when the Bayhead, the centre of the local ship-building and ship-repair industry, employed about 9 000 people.

However, the Bayhead could be given a boost if another plan to get it declared a special economic zone under the Department of Trade and Industry is successful.

This would mean incentives, including tax rebates, for new and upgraded industries there. Transnet would still own the land, but there would be a more enabling environment.

Transnet was a logistics company and should not be solely responsible for infrastructure, Maharaj felt.

The session also called for the speedy development of a boat-building park. “And if we want to be a great industry, we need more ship-repair berths,” Maharaj added. “The demand is there. We just need to get our house in order and create an enabling environment.”

Another report will be carried out on the manufacture and supply of components, which would prevent manufacturers having to import them. This would grow the ship-building industry.

The “elephant in the room”, said Maharaj, was the “exorbitant rents” that Transnet charged.

Mike Hawes, a maritime logistics consultant and the industry representative on the Operation Phakisa project, the presidential initiative which aims to exploit the ocean economy, said some of the objectives of Operation Phakisa (meaning “hurry up”) were not being hurried at all.

“We are waiting for some of the simple things, like the supply of cranes.”

PICTURES: EPA LIGHT-BULB MOMENT: Visitors observe furniture and home accessories at the Salone del Mobile trade fair in Rho-Pero near Milan, Italy, on Tuesday. The fair, considered the largest of its kind in the world, presents the latest trends and designs on...

PICTURE: BRIAN SPURR HARBOURING PLANS: An aerial shot showing Durban’s iconic Moses Mabhida Stadium. A recent maritime summit plans to boost the Bayhead as part of their aim to revive the shipping industry.