Thirteen years before the formal
introduction of containers in
South Africa, a Grindrod board
meeting in 1964 discussed an agenda
item – “Containerisation” – which
was acted upon and resulted in the
company being well prepared for
the inception of containerisation in
South Africa in 1977.
“Well before the South Africa-
Europe Conference had finalised
their deep-sea container ship
arrangements, Grindrod moved
to ensure that it would be well
prepared for the advent of large-scale
containerised shipments in South
Africa,” according to the company’s
2010 hundredth anniversary
commemorative book.
With the bareboat charter of the
new ro-ro containership Voorloper
from 1971, Unicorn (part of the
Grindrod Group) began organising
shoreside logistics networks that
included the establishment of
container depots – initially in
Durban and Cape Town. These
depots would become blueprints for
future port facilities countrywide.
From Durban shipyard, the company
ordered the 324-TEU feeder
containerships Berg and Breede, the
only fully cellular containerships to
be built in South Africa.
Grindrod’s containerised cargo
operations are now undertaken
through Grindrod Intermodal and
Ocean Africa Container Lines.
Apart from its presence in South
Africa, it has also established itself
in neighbouring countries as intra-
African and general African world
trade expands and the nature of
products using container transport
alters.
In 2015, Grindrod opened its
flagship Gauteng Intermodal
Terminal in Denver, Johannesburg,
a 135 000-sqm transport hub
consisting of a container yard,
warehouse and minerals yard,
connecting markets as far as
Zambia, Malawi, Democratic
Republic of Congo, Botswana and
Zimbabwe with ports of Durban,
Maputo and Richards Bay. The
facility offers multimodal solutions
with a private rail siding capable of
handling full size container blocktrains
and onsite road transport
solutions.
Last year Grindrod acquired a dry
port in Nacala, Mozambique, which
is to be developed into a purposebuilt
intermodal terminal with
warehousing and a container yard.
In March this year, Grindrod
Intermodal celebrated the opening of
Arcelor Mittal South Africa (AMSA)
Distribution Centre in Isando to
transfer the transportation of steel
from road to rail. The steel will be
transported from its production
facilities in Newcastle to Gauteng.
Grindrod has been contracted to
operate the distribution centre in
Isando.
Different era... familiar brand.
