Hauliers defy the odds in the face of declining exports

Infrastructure upgrades planned
JAMES HALL
NEW ROAD transport operators continue to enter the competitive inland haulage business, while established road and rail firms expand their operations. Both trends are evidence of a continuously vibrant cargo delivery business in the country. “The national economy has suffered from losses in the textile and garment sectors, but we have not seen a reduction in the number of road freight operators who transport raw materials and export finished products,” said an official with the Central Bank of Swaziland. Swaziland’s main export product, sugar, suffered a 37% decline in profits due to a strong rand, to which the national currency, the lilangeni, is pegged. This makes the commodity less competitive globally just as world sugar prices are declining, and the European Union has announced a lowering of the price it will pay for Swazi sugar. The strong rand is also making Swazi-made garments more expensive, as simultaneously cheaper Chinese-made clothes are flooding world markets. The growth of the garment industry in recent years has been a boon to Swaziland Railways, and saw the establishment of several new road transport companies and freight forwarding firms at the centrally located Matsapha Industrial Estate, outside the commercial town Manzini. Some of Matsapha’s garment factories are scaling down operations or shutting altogether this year, but government is actively seeking new foreign investors through the Swaziland Investment Promotion Authority (SIPA). King Mswati also launched a R1 billion public-private job-creation initiative targeting smaller and medium sized enterprises. Government hopes these start-up firms will engage in export businesses, which will benefit transport firms. Recently, King Mswati also inspected the first runway completed as part of the new Sikhupe International Airport in eastern Swaziland. The facility will allow wide-bodied aircraft to land in the country for the first time, and open the possibility of large-scale air transport. One new company plans to market cut flowers to Europe, and will depend on airfreight. Innovative new industries will lessen the small landlocked country’s economic dependence on a handful of exports, whose profitability has proven volatile this year. Government recognises the importance of a vital road and rail transport infrastructure, and continues to invest in newer highways and better roads. Key projects in 2005 are a bypass road around Mbabane which will allow road freight to skirt around the capital city’s congested downtown, and the transformation of the country’s main east-west highway into Swaziland’s first toll road, expected when enabling legislation clears parliament this year. Industrial activity continues to be decentralised away from Matsapha with the ongoing expansion of an industrial area outside the southern provincial capital Nhlangano. The long-awaited opening this past year of Swaziland’s second border post with Mozambique has facilitated freight travel to Maputo, and invigorated the eastern provincial capital Siteki, making feasible hopes for an industrial park there.