The Universities of Stellenbosch and Johannesburg have joined hands with the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) to launch the country’s first Centre for Sustainable Road Freight South Africa (SRF-SA).
This unique grouping – which aims to address sustainable road freight challenges such as the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 5% by 2050 – held its first workshop with government and industry in Stellenbosch last week. Linked to the Centre for Sustainable Road Freight in the United Kingdom (SRF), the centre brings together a broad range of expertise in vehicle dynamics, road safety, mechanical engineering, rail and road logistics, transport economics, industrial engineering, and transport regulation whilst representing the premier scientific research and development expertise in these fields.
According to Professor Jan Havenga of the logistics department at the University of Stellenbosch, road freight operators as well as manufacturing companies are encouraged to become members of the SRF-SA. There would be close collaboration with governmental organisations such as the SA Department of Transport (DoT), the Department of Science and Technology (DST), and the Department of Trade and Industry (dti), he said.
“The Centre aims to support its activities through a combination of subscriptions from industry partners and research grants,” said Professor Frank Kienhöfer of the University of Johannesburg. At the heart of its activities would be the promotion of road freight sustainability in South Africa, recognising the country’s unique challenges – unemployment and the fact of its highest global economic inequality. According to Havenga the SRF-SA will develop innovative technical and operational solutions to freight challenges while establishing long-term research collaborations with government and industry to support their decarbonisation activities.
“Instead of all the different entities in the country doing their own research it is now facilitated through one centre where industry and government become the drivers of the research,” explained Havenga. “This will see the academics deliver research that gives government the information it requires to make policy decisions, while at the same time industry will be supplied with research that makes for informed decision making.”
According to Professor David Cebon from the University of Cambridge, where the first centre of its kind was opened five years ago, it has been a valuable contribution to sustainable road freight. “We have learnt many lessons over the past years and the biggest has been that when it comes to carbon emissions it cannot be done through a silo approach.”
In fact, said Cebon, it needed to be a bigger collaboration than just a country approach – rather a global one. It was with this in mind that the UK centre contacted China and then South Africa. Discussions with India for a similar centre in that country are under way
CAPTION
Paul Nordengen of the CSRI , Professor Jan Havenga of the University of Stellenbosch, Professor David Cebon from the University of Cambridge, and Professor Frank Kienhöfer of the University of Johannesburg at the first workshop of the newly launched Centre for Sustainable Road Freight South Africa (SRF-SA).
