Shippers can only guess at new port tariff

. . . as they await end February deadline Alan Peat THE NEW ports' tariff structure and the new unitary wharfage rates (replacing the current, and much despised, ad valorem wharfage) will be published at the end of this month (February), Nico Walters, senior manager for trade and logistics at the national Ports Authority (NPA) told FTW on Monday. But they will not be open to any comment, he added. All the principles behind the new structure and how it will be phased in were agreed with clients at a series of meetings last year. "The published rates will be applicable in May," said Walters. The freight industry still has no clue how much per container they're going to pay for wharfage - and it's getting late in the day. "A lot of overseas contracts are signed up for months in advance," said Nolene Lossau, executive director of the SA Shippers Council. "So a lot of major exporters want to know urgently just how much extra they might face under the new wharfage levy. At the same time, importers are concerned to know what this will do to their pricing lists." Another problem is that this new levy looks as though it may be variable across cargo categories. NPA said last year that it would be "unit-rated cargo dues, differentiated between cargo types." "The trouble," said Colin Schultz, distribution manager for SANS Fibres - one of the Cape's big exporters - and chairman of the Cape Cargo Owners Association, "is that we don't know." But he does indicate that the current minimum charge is R204, and the maximum R9 424 per harbour ton - and expects the new charge has to fall in between the two. Although shippers would like it as low down the range as possible, a major factor in where it actually lodges will be how much income Portnet and parent, Transnet, expect it to generate. FTW was given an estimate of "anything from 10% to 30% of the existing levels."