Business body lashes out at failure of freight logistics strategy

Concern over focus on rail to exclusion of other modes KEVIN MAYHEW THE NATIONAL Freight Logistics Strategy (NFLS) has been condemned by one of the country’s most influential business bodies for lack of sufficient consultation in its development. It reflects a failure by government to take a leadership role in areas where it could be expected to, says the multi-disciplined Business Unity South Africa (Busa). The body has called on government to create a specific forum to allow proper engagement with private sector logistics players to ensure a comprehensive understanding of problems experienced by cargo owners and transport operators. “This will enable transport operators to propose interventions that have a real chance of changing the landscape of freight logistics in the country,” says Busa. The NFLS is rail-orientated and this presents the real danger that proposed interventions “will be focused on rail at the expense of other modes of transport”, says Busa. “The danger with such a one-sided approach to the freight task is that interventions ameliorate rail sector challenges when rail currently moves less that 20% of cargo,” Busa explained. On the other hand the bottlenecks and challenges experienced by the road, maritime and aviation sectors that are presently responsible for the other 80% of cargo movement have not been adequately addressed in the strategy. It also fails to address the prime motivation of the survey - concerns over the high costs of doing business in South Africa, says Busa. Whereas the transport sector constitutes a large cost factor, the strategy does not provide sufficient guidance on the requisite interventions that will result in the reduction of transport input costs, it challenged. Busa’s third major concern is that many operational issues that pre-occupy transport operators and their customers are largely not dealt with in the strategy.