Rangel upbeat about road freight and cross-border services

E-commerce growth, along with the multiple trade agreements that exist between African countries, have been facilitating and encouraging cross-border services, according to Tiago Pocinho, country manager for South Africa and Zambia at Rangel Logistics Solutions.“Various sectors, such as the car trade, are increasingly demanding the development of road freight transport services in order to ensure fast, sustainable and affordable transport within countries and in the region,” he said.The impact of Covid-19, however, cannot be overlooked as the preventive measures adopted since the outbreak of the pandemic continue to affect cross-border value chains and trade and transport services. “In the case of fruit exporters, for example, many transported their goods across the country to Port Elizabeth and, in some cases, to Durban 1 635km away,” he told Freight News.Pocinho said a major challenge remained the long delays at border posts waiting for customs clearance. “Mitigating delays as much as possible is an important part of the service we bring to customers. In this regard, we use our own forwarding agent, who will ensure that all documentation is dealt with in a timely manner, pre-clearing the goods where possible in order to speed up the f low of cargo across borders.”Rangel is present on the main borders of Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Botswana and Namibia, offering clearing agent services.According to Pocinho, in order to improve volumes it is essential that cargo moves with greater speed and security throughout the cross-border process.“There are many contexts that inf luence cross-border operations. We can see that Covid-19 has greatly inf luenced cargo f low in recent years, and with this the behaviour of companies.”At the height of the pandemic, there was a lack of container availability for cargo transportation. This caused stock failures for several customers, compromising the normal functioning of the supply chain.“Nowadays, we notice that companies are more sensitive and attentive to their stock, wanting to guarantee a high number of them. Also, the inf lation of container prices has led to a search for alternatives to air and sea transport. Road freight is seen as a solution together with the cross-border service.”He said one sector that was seeing growth was fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) since it represented essential trade for society.He added that despite the challenges in the cross-border sector, there were many opportunities too, with ongoing growth in volumes anticipated. Hence, Rangel was planning to continue investing in its own f leet and infrastructure to support the cross-border service. For example, it planned to have cross-docking warehouses located in strategic points in southern Africa. Rangel, a company founded in 1980 in Portugal, is a global logistics partner with worldwide coverage. Growth in Africa has always occurred organically for Rangel according to client needs and demands. Currently, the cross-border sector is the service that the company wants to focus on, and this is where it intends directing a large part of its future investments.