The new booking system which was rolled out at the Port of Port Elizabeth in October has caused extensive logjams and backlogs in shipping products to and from market, says Denise van Huyssteen, CEO of the Nelson Mandela Bay Business Chamber.\u00a0\u201cThe new system which was intended to improve port efficiencies has had the opposite effect, impacting upon the viability of exporters and importers who are unable to get their products transported timeously.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cA number of businesses have indicated that their customers in key markets are considering cancelling their export orders if these delays continue,\u201d she says. \u201cAs part of mitigation efforts to retain export business, some businesses in the Bay are even transporting their goods via road to Walvis Bay and Maputo ports.\u00a0This is clearly not a sustainable situation and we need our two ports to be functioning optimally.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe additional logistics costs incurred by transporting goods via road to other ports are making our exporters uncompetitive versus overseas manufacturers, who do not have to contend with these types of costs and delays.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to the World Bank\u2019s Container Port Performance Index, South Africa\u2019s ports are rated amongst the poorest performing in the world with the Port of Port Elizabeth ranked at 291 out of 348 and Port of Ngqura at 338 out of 348.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n
The Chamber approached Transnet in early September, appealing to them to not proceed with the roll-out of the new booking system, until such time as the issues relating to its implementation at the Durban and Cape Town ports had been resolved. \u201cAt the time we emphasised the need for constructive engagement to take place on the practical implementation of the system at the ports.\u00a0 We indicated that we were aligned with Transnet on the need for productivity levels to be improved at the ports and to unlock supply chain gains, but that this could not be achieved through the roll-out of a system that was problematic.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSince the roll-out of the system last month insufficient slots have been made available to meet the needs of customers.\u00a0The system only allows bookings to be made once containers are available, resulting in customers not securing slots.\u00a0This in turn has an immediate impact on the ability of businesses to get their goods in and out of the harbour.\u201d<\/p>\n
Van Huyssteen said that it is vital that Transnet urgently meets with business to discuss the practicalities of the system and what can be done to resolve the issues.\u00a0\u201cWe are supportive of any measures to improve productivity but this cannot only be workable in theory but not achievable in reality.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOur recommendation is that Transnet pauses on the roll-out of the new booking system at Ngqura later this month, until such time as the issues relating to the Port Elizabeth Port system roll-out are resolved.\u00a0It makes no sense to further exacerbate the problem without addressing the actual issues.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The new booking system which was rolled out at the Port of Port Elizabeth in October has caused extensive logjams and backlogs in shipping products to and from market, says Denise van Huyssteen, CEO of the Nelson Mandela Bay Business Chamber.\u00a0\u201cThe new system which was intended to improve port efficiencies has had the opposite effect, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[540],"tags":[551],"class_list":["post-5308","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-business-news","tag-nmbbc","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5308","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5308"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5308\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5309,"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5308\/revisions\/5309"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5308"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5308"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5308"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}