New courses will educate senior staff on dangerous goods procedures

STOP PLACING the blame for container hold-ups at the feet of customs officials. Instead look at the inflexibility of top management in companies involved in imports and exports, where revenue is often more valuable to them than safety, says Neville Symons of Dangerous Goods Management. "We are finding more and more that when companies call on us to sort out the problems they are experiencing at the country's ports, it is their inefficiency rather than the heavy hand of customs that is at fault," he says. "The problem all too often is that while they send their junior employees to attend courses on dangerous goods, they are reluctant to implement what the trainee insists should be observed. So often we are told a process has been working satisfactorily for them during the past decade or two, and they are reluctant to change. "We get comments such as 'why must we spend the extra on a new drum when a reconditioned one is far cheaper'. But that doesn't always meet the requirements of customs and shipping lines, and therein lies the problem." DGM's training schedule will be expanded in the year ahead, with several new courses aimed mainly at more senior personnel who will be taught the procedures in risk management portfolios. The courses will focus on the many new regulations that are coming into play. "We are satisfied that top management needs training more than the juniors," says Symons. "We are getting more and more calls from Portnet about problems with incorrectly packed containers and documentation these days. It shows they are really becoming more proactive and shippers have to be alert to the fact. "Customs worldwide are doing more and more spot-checking of containers. We had one which was sent recently from Gauteng to Durban and shipped on to Rotterdam for transportation to Poland. At its destination Polish customs checked it and found irregularities that resulted in the exporter being fined US$40 000. "These are the type of companies where top management needs to be made aware of the seriousness of proper packaging and transporting of dangerous goods internationally."