Bit of oomph can restart SA’s maritime engine
MY TRAVELS – mainly related to my forthcoming book on Cape Town’s Dockland – have taken me around in recent days. Among the visited places was Blouberg Strand with its magnificent view of Table Mountain whose pastel colouring at virtually any time of the day lends its name to that beautiful strand.
It is also a wonderful place from which to watch the ships in the roadstead, and on my visit last week, two product tankers were awaiting berths in the Tanker Basin to discharge cargoes. Now that no tankers fly the South African flag, foreign vessels move all the cargoes of oil products from Durban and Cape Town to other ports. Revenue they earn goes to shipowners abroad, leaving little behind, apart from payments made to ancillary services whose charges pale when compared to the freight rates.
And, of course, instead of South African seafarers being aboard the coastal tankers, foreigners now earn reasonable salaries aboard foreignregistered ships that move South African-generated cargoes between South
African ports. I know of several young, highly competent but unemployed officers who would love such a position to put bread on their tables.
What is the highly-paid minister of transport doing about this blatant anomaly? But lest he should respond with a knee-jerk reaction, let me caution that the problem has been creeping upon us owing to government lethargy, and can only be resolved with a very carefully devised plan that will need time to co-ordinate properly. This is not a task for loyal cadres, but for seasoned maritime professionals.
And then I visited those helpful and warmly hospitable folks in the Port Control Tower, a structure built in 1976 to replace the obsolete port control centre that was housed in prefabricated buildings atop the Grain Elevator.
Although impaired partly by the table cloth over the mountain that day, the view from the tower nevertheless was stunning.
At A Berth and bound for the US Gulf in May 2021 was the well-laden MACS multipurpose vessel Silverfjord, a 185m vessel with a capacity for 1 705 teu. On deck she had several new stainless steel tank containers. Indeed, the construction of stainless steel containers represents a local industry that has made its mark in the international market for these containers.
Once the departure berth for the weekly northbound Union-Castle mailships, A Berth has changed. The shed was built in the late 1930s and each Friday, thronged with excited passengers about to board the mailship for a leisurely two-week voyage to Southampton. After the mailship service ceased in 1977, the shed fell into disrepair and was demolished some years later.
However, A Berth assumed a new and important role. It was refashioned as a shiprepair facility, targeting mainly vessels and structures associated with the offshore oil and gas sector.
Prior to her service on the Sable Oilfield south-west of Mossel Bay, the FPSO Glas Dowr had undergone an extensive refit at the berth, a project that reportedly brought millions of dollars to the economy of Cape Town and provided work for hundreds of
people. When she ceased operations on the oilfield a decade later, she was towed to Cape Town prior to being laid up in Gqeberha (Port Elizabeth).
Later, she was towed to Singapore for a major refit before taking up station on an oilfield in the Timor Sea. (What a pity that the local marine engineering sector did not get that massive contract!)
Within a few years, storage facilities, offices and workshops had been built, but an extensive area was left open for the construction of various parts and fittings for oil rigs or other vessels undergoing refit at the berth, and for the operation of heavylift mobile cranes, so vital to any major engineering work.
The halcyon days came to an end following the drop in the oil price, and the collapse of the offshore oil and gas sector. From every offshore oil or gas field – and from prospecting sites all over the world, including West Africa – rigs, drillships, pipelayers, FPSOs, offshore service vessels and many others were laid up, and there certainly was a shortage of revenue for maintenance work.
As no rigs or other large structures came for refit, the local repair industry that had been geared for its offshore clients began to decline. After holding out for as long as possible, the new facilities at A Berth closed.
However, pragmatism within the port authorities prevailed and, apart from accommodating the local office and storage facilities of Resolve Marine, an international salvage operator, A Berth is used now for general cargo operations and for some geared containerships to work their cargo for which the large open area of the wharf serves as a very convenient stacking area for containers.
Bright pockets can be found in the otherwise rather dreary South African maritime sector, but with careful planning and decisive action, so many more thriving areas can be developed. It just needs a bit of oomph to restart the country’s maritime engine.