TNPA wants performance standards for entire industry

Tops, Mops, Rops and Hops will gain you entry to a port industry nirvana. So sayeth Herbert Msagala, COO of Transnet National Ports Authority (TNPA). Added to last year’s terminal operator performance standards (Tops), the authority has now also got its eyes on marine operator performance standards (Mops), rail operator performance standards (Rops) and haulier operator performance standards (Hops). What’s behind this acronymic plan, according to Msagala, is that with Tops port terminals now have a performance standard to work from. But the whole rather than just the terminal part of the port supply chain has to be managed. And there is distinct justification for this plan. “We (the TNPA),” said Msagala, “found that capacity was being wasted in all areas of the port system – marine, terminals, rail and road – although the extent of the waste did differ between the segments.” And that sets the scene for the first port operational centre. The Port of Durban is due to go live in August. And its operational centre will control and co-ordinate all the marine, terminal, and road and rail systems within and around the port. And the benefit of the electronic data interchange (EDI) nature of the beast is that it will allow the TNPA to record delays in real time. It will also generate same-day port performance figures. When it eventually goes national it will also enable rescheduling of delayed ships with their next port of call. All very well, but does this monitoring system work in the eyes of a private sector observer? FTW discussed this matter with a freight group senior executive. And, when we posed that question, he suggested that if you wanted to be cynical you would suggest that instinct and experience led you to believe it would be no more than a paper-producing wonder. That no practical or operational advantages would transpire from the number-crunching. “That’s the danger,” he told FTW. “But I believe that it’s a genuine and positive effort on the part of Transnet.” The principle behind the system, according to our contact, is that – when an inefficiency has been identified – “that should automatically lead to role-players and port management getting together to ask: ‘Why, and what must be done about it?’ This should then result in an adjustment being made and to become more productive.” There has to be a relationship between the port users and port management if the system is to produce its full potential, our observer insisted. “The system will give you the data. And that’s very important. “What is to be hoped is that the data is analysed, and the guys say: ‘Let’s sit down and try to get it better by asking and answering all the lateral questions surrounding the issue’. “That’s what we need. Meetings between all the stakeholders to ‘get it better’.”