Lines and Portnet set up crisis-solving forum

A forum of ten major shipping lines and senior Portnet management is to meet regularly to discuss ways of improving productivity and work methods at South Africa's ports. This means that technical and operational issues can now be addressed direct at senior level.
This was the result of last week's urgent meeting demanded by the lines with Portnet managing director Rob Childs, and was aimed at addressing the serious crisis in the container ports. After weeks of go-slows and strikes leading to severe congestion and delays to shipping, losses amounting to hundreds of millions of rand have been incurred, and the lines have threatened to withhold payments of their port accounts. FTW understands that at least one shipping major may already have carried out this threat.
The introduction of a congestion surcharge was one of the suggested options. Meanwhile, several shipping lines have been forced to reroute their ships to other ports while Portnet attempts to catch up on the backlog at Durban, a difficult undertaking as reports continue to come in of containers being moved around the stacking area without authorisation and without updating records. Maersk, which recently announced it would switch from the combi terminal to Durban's container terminal, has now opted to reroute all Gauteng-bound imports to Port Elizabeth with immediate effect, while the Good Hope Express has announced they will use East London for all container shipments in future.