‘Border crossing times must be reduced’

Trade facilitation is a key element of the North South Corridor Programme, with a number of issues currently under the spotlight. “These include harmonisation of customs procedures and legislation, road safety programmes and programmes to address HIV Aids,” says regional trade expert and head of the Regional Trade Facilitation Programme in Pretoria, Mark Pearson. “Crossing of borders currently takes between one and five days,” Pearson told FTW. “Since the cost of a truck sitting idle is $200-$400 a day, if you can reduce the time taken at borders you can significantly reduce the cost of transport in the region - and that can be achieved through harmonisation of procedures, putting in more modern procedures and ensuring that scanners are working. It’s not just a question of having a one stop border post.” Harmonisation of axle loads and vehicle dimension limits, and third party and transit systems are all key issues. According to Pearson, an analysis of the whole road network in the North South Corridor has been undertaken. “Most roads are in good condition but there’s quite a backlog in terms of rehabilitation and maintenance.” Several programmes are also in place to address the rail network. “One is to look at the concession agreements,” says Pearson. “Every railroad north of South Africa is concessioned to a private company with the exception of Tazara. It’s a monopoly concession and the general consensus is that those agreements are not working – they’ve merely moved from a non-functioning public sector monopoly to a non functioning private sector monopoly.” The idea is to find a way to make those concessions work. “With the price of copper dropping it’s important to reduce the transport costs of copper otherwise you don’t make any margins at all.” Port capacity is also an important part of the mix. “The two main ports are Durban, which is already being upgraded and Dar es Salaam where a major port masterplan has just been completed. “They’re talking about a new container terminal and dredging to 12m which will take the larger panamax vessels – but the problem is funding.” According to Pearson a number of funding mechanisms are under consideration and this was a key focus at this week’s Lusaka conference.