Diversification sees growth in WCS export business

The South African LCL export market, traditionally a prepaid market, is slowly but surely changing, according to Alistair Heald of World Cargo Services (WCS). “It has been changing from the traditional prepaid market as more and more consignees move towards nominating the NVOCC/ freight forwarder. The reason for this is twofold,” he said. “Firstly, consignees want to control their ocean and landside costs, particularly as destination rebates become more prevalent, while the effects of global contracts are also being felt more and more.” All of this, said Heald, has required quite a mind-set change – especially when receiving cargo nominations from destination agents. World Cargo Services, best known for its air and sea import services from the USA, UK and China, has added to its service offering and now has a fully fledged groupage export service to multiple destinations. “This is in line with WCS’s global expansion programme. Our export department has grown rapidly despite the economy and we now consider ourselves a player in this market,” said Heald. “Groupage cargo is being consigned to our established overseas partners and has led to new opportunities for us in establishing new agents in West and East Africa, where we have seen a lot of activity. Similarly our overseas agents are sending their East and Africa freight either direct or to us for transhipment via Durban.” He said WCS would continue to participate in exchange sales visits with its overseas agents to ensure that the services on offer are being promoted at origin and destination points.