SATI sets its sights on terminal ownership

Ray Sumts EVEN CABINET ministers are open to correction - as trade and industry minister Alec Erwin readily admitted last week when recalling his initial concerns about Safmarine falling into foreign hands. The sale two years ago of South Africa's maritime pride and joy to the giant Danish A.P.Moller Group for R2,2 billion has led to only better things from an investment perspective, a fact alluded to by Erwin last week while opening fledgling S.A.T.I. Container Services' new R40 million specialist reefer container logistics facility, storage and maintenance depot at Killarney Gardens, 12km outside Cape Town. In partnership with the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC), this is the first investment by Southern Africa Transport Investments, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the A.P.Moller Group holding a 50% stake and Safmarine and Maersk South Africa 25% each. The depot, with its own rail facility to the port, currently utilises about 6,5 hectares of land, half the size of that available, specialising not only in sophisticated technical reefer maintenance previously carried out by necessity in Spain and Taiwan but also in general purpose boxes. The intention is for Safmarine and Maersk Sealand to utilise 80% of the facility, the remainder open to outsiders including shipping competitors. Peter Ehrenreich, managing director of Maersk South Africa, emphasised he was not in 'bragging' mode by alluding to the swift 'in and out' vehicle waiting time of six minutes at the new depot compared with 45 minutes to two hours at some other Cape Town depots. "That has a tremendous impact on our client service." Currently the depot, with a capacity of 6 500 boxes, is handling up to 3 000 boxes a month and has between 60 and 80 plug points available, which will increase to 300 by year end, says S.A.T.I.'s managing director Brett Gray. Southern Africa Transport Investments is essentially a land-based transport investment company with the objective of being the service provider of choice for intermodal transport services within Southern Africa. It also aims at future involvement in owning and operating South African container terminals, developing coastal depots and inland terminals, and investing in stevedoring and logistics - in full co-operation with government, relevant stakeholders and in partnership with black empowerment groups. (Maersk Sealand is the world's largest container terminal operator (32) and third largest in terms of throughput (12,1 million TEU). Peter Ehrenreich . . . vehicle waiting time is six minutes at the new depot compared with 45 minutes to two hours at some other Cape Town depots.