Stats SA to reinstate monthly roadfreight survey

With the South African economy probably more dependent on roadfreight transport than any other in the world, there is no doubting the importance of being able to measure freight volumes. Vincent Parker, senior statistician at Statistics South Africa, told delegates at the annual Road Freight Association conference in Vanderbijlpark last week that with Gauteng being the only major industrial centre in the world not situated on a waterway, the country’s economic hub remained extremely reliant on road transport. “South Africa contributes 0.4% of the global GDP, with the volume of land freight transport in South Africa being about 2.2% of the global total.” He said for this reason the information on the cost of transport and the cost per unit remained essential not only to understand but also manage the economy. “The Department of Transport needs data on volumes in order to plan and maintain the road network,” he said. “South Africa has no official statistics on road freight volumes. The CSIR publishes annual estimates of road freight volumes, but these estimates are not regarded as official.” According to Parker the main obstacle to declaring the estimates official is that the estimates have no measure of variance. He said in an attempt to address the problem around the measurement of freight volumes a monthly survey of road transport that was discontinued in 2003, is set to be reinstated in coming months.