Roads, ports chaos blow to SA exports
Trucking queues 37km long, ships waiting for 19 days to unload as transport mess spirals
● Failing ports, congested roads and the collapse of Transnet are dealing a death blow to the economy as vital exports are held up on blocked roads with further delays at dilapidated ports now rated among the worst in Africa.
And there seems no prospect of the situation improving any time soon, experts say, which is bad news for an economy that relies heavily on exports to generate foreign exchange and could potentially employ millions more people.
Rudi Dicks, joint head of President Cyril Ramaphosa’s much-vaunted turnaround plan, Operation Vulindlela, admits the situation is “fast becoming unsustainable”.
“We recognise the problem and the scope of it. The congestion has been building up over time,” Dicks said.
The transport crisis, which is rapidly displacing load-shedding as the main stumbling block to reviving South Africa’s dormant economy, is being felt on major national roads.
In a massive blow, Maersk, one of the world’s biggest shipping lines, frustrated with delays at Cape Town harbour, has confirmed it will now bypass the Mother City and offload South Africa-bound container cargo in Mauritius, from where it will be moved to South Africa in smaller vessels.
The situation is little better in Durban. On Friday, the average vessel waiting time at Container Terminal Pier 2 was 457 hours, or 19 days, according to a Transnet Port Terminals (TPT) national recovery update.
Average delays at the Durban Multipurpose Terminal were 365 hours (15 days).
By Friday, according to Transnet’s website, at Container Terminal Pier 1 four ships were berthed with a further 16 anchored and awaiting to be serviced.
Importers are now opting to fly goods into South Africa, at higher cost, due to the port delays.
Several shipping lines are now imposing surcharges, claiming that delays in South Africa are disrupting their international schedules. Among them are Hapag-Lloyd, Maersk, MSC and CMA CGM.
The ports breakdown is mirrored by the developing chaos on major road transport routes. This week, protests and fighting broke out among truck and taxi drivers stuck in a 37km queue at the Lebombo border post. Two patrol vehicles were torched.
In Richards Bay, the uMhlathuze local municipality is spending R1m a month on overtime for traffic officers to man the heav
ily congested road to the port, and is seeking “legal remedies” against those responsible for processing the trucks at the port.
The municipality spent its entire R4m annual overtime budget paying about 40 traffic cops in the first four months of its financial year about R25,000 per month per officer.
The traffic department has now asked the city manager for another R14m to pay overtime for the rest of the year for officers who often work more than 15 hours a day.
Municipal spokesperson Bongani Gina told the Sunday Times: “The officers have been working tirelessly to manage the truck congestion, and their overtime has been vital in ensuring the safety and flow of traffic in the face of this growing challenge. On average, traffic officers have been receiving additional monthly overtime income that exceeds their monthly payments.
“The budget set aside for traffic officers’ overtime has been depleted since July 2023, largely because of deployments at the N2 entry point into John Ross around the clock seven days a week.”
TPT warned on Friday it may suspend the processing of trucks bringing cargo into Richards Bay, to try to cut back on bottlenecks.
At the core of the problem is infrastructure, with ports short of gantry cranes to load and unload containers.
The South African Association of Freight Forwarders (Saaff) said the Cape Town port needed 28 cranes. On one day this week, it started with 18 cranes, but five broke during the day.
“We are losing our ‘gateway to Africa’ status. Losing this tag happens slowly however, what is clear is that we are seeing ever more businesses looking into alternative ports,” said Saaff research head Jacob van Rensburg.
Dicks said they were aware of the ripple effects of the problem.
“We are working on a number of short-term interventions and on the longer term, some structural changes. We are co-ordinating work with Transnet. There are maintenance and equipment issues required to be fixed,” he said.
“There are many unintended consequences because of the congestion at our ports. You will find that congestion at a harbour will force people to find another way to get their products to the international markets, like what is happening now with companies trucking their goods through Komatipoort to reach a foreign harbour.”
He agrees the situation is untenable. “Considering that about 50% of the value of our exports from South Africa comes from commodities, this is something that needs to be fixed urgently. We set up the National Logistics Crisis Committee and from there we are working on interventions.”
Money is a problem.
“To fix our harbours Transnet National Ports Authority will need about R50bn in capital expenditure that is not in its budget. The questions now are where we will get the money from and when. We cannot afford to wait a year,” Dicks said.
“We have mobilised a lot of entities to help with this, including the departments of transport and public enterprises and the National Treasury.”
Road Freight Association CEO Gavin Kelly said the country was in “a crisis of immense proportions”.
“When you tell industry the port will no longer accept your product for export because of your inability to manage the flow and volumes of goods moving through the port, the whole world sits up and takes notice. The customers on the other side are international. Those markets take note and go looking for the goods from another country.
“This is the worst crisis that South Africa has ever experienced at its ports. However, there are some reports that in the 1950s South Africa experienced severe constraints and then went on a huge modernisation and expansion programme, resulting in us having the ports we have today.”
He said three factors were at play here. “First there is the collapse of Transnet Freight Rail [TFR], which has resulted in the huge shift of bulk cargo moving from dedicated rail and terminal infrastructure to road.
“Second, TPT showed no foresight or leadership in being able to assess what was happening and what the result would be. Nor did it take the necessary steps to reduce flows through either scheduling deliveries to meet port loading abilities, or to create stacks, or to place pressure on TFR to resolve the crisis.
“Third, it is patently evident that running logistics and ensuring the supply chain is reliable, dependable, efficient and secure is the role of the private sector not political administrative systems that do not understand competition and the needs of economies or industry. The various ministers responsible for overseeing Transnet and similar SOEs [stateowned entities] have constantly been approached, they have seen the steady decay but have done nothing.
“It is virtually impossible to get any rational answer from those who are responsible and accountable for securing the efficient operation of this vitally important rail link.
“Quite the contrary excuses are the flavour of the day. Reports of similar challenges relating to the Saldanha and Sishen lines are also starting to appear. There is a deliberate attack on supply chains and there seems to be no will from the state role-players to address this.”
Kelly said there were short- and long-term actions that needed to be taken.
“In the short term, we should ask all exporters to hold back on moving product to port for 14 days, identify and set up stockpile locations away from the port, activate resources to clear the current product at the port, restart supply chain, ascertain the causes and solutions and create private sector logistics team to manage process.
In the long term, South Africa must apply concessions, dissolve Transnet and allow more private sector involvement, “similar to concessions on toll roads”.
Yesterday Mpumalanga MEC for safety and security Vusi Shongwe said the average time trucks spent waiting at the Lebombo border post was seven days.
“The length of the queue is about 37km. To manage that queue by solving the issues at the border is a national competency and falls outside my mandate.
“This is in a place with little to no access to restrooms and toilets or shops. The situation is infringing on both the taxi drivers’ and the truckers’ human rights.”