South African Airways has identified the pharma industry as a niche focus for the future. With a temperaturesensitive product like pharmaceuticals it will be about controlling the entire supply chain, which will involve a lot of ground work, said SAA Cargo national sales manager, Ronel Rossouw. “It’s good to have a pharma product, but if we take it on board we must be able to guarantee that it will be controlled to the end of the supply chain. And in Africa that’s a difficult undertaking – with power issues and language challenges all coming into the equation. “There’s currently a drive to sign up SLAs (service level agreements) with ground handling companies that can provide us with the necessary reassurance,” she said. Infrastructure is an additional challenge and SAA Cargo could look at setting up warehouses where these are in short supply. “At the moment we’re looking at trial shipments where we are testing the waters. The next step will be to base SAA staff in countries where the product is offered to ensure full control over the process.”
