Toll hike compounds hauliers’ woes

THE TOLL tariff adjustment announced last week by the South African National Roads Agency Limited (Sanral) will translate into an increase in excess of 8% for hauliers on the DBN-JHB N3 corridor come March 1. “This annual adjustment is effective on all national toll routes in the country and has been approved by the Minister of Transport, adjusted in accordance with the Consumer Price Index (CPI) to ensure that the increases remain fair,” chief executive officer of Sanral, Nazir Alli, told FTW. “Toll financing allows government to add capacity (new highways or additional lanes) that cannot otherwise be funded under the current and projected transportation budget scenario,” he said. But the freight industry is not impressed. “It’s just another cost that we are going to have to absorb and pass on,” says Mario Nobrega of Durban based Africa Transit Cargo. “Personally, I think it’s a plot to get us off the roads and onto rail.” “I think you will see a good few transporters diverting to alternate routes to avoid the tolls to keep operating costs down,” says Paul Botha of Gauteng-based Freight Haul. “These roads are heavily potholed and not built for heavy loads and volumes, which may push up the maintenance costs. But even more concerning is the cost of fuel.” “We are tabulating the figures and trying to work out rates at the moment,” says Gerald Naidu of SA Inland Logistics. “The new tolls and the increased price of diesel following the finance minister’s speech last week will be a huge additional cost.” While one transporter remarked: “It would be nice if more of the collected monies actually went back into road maintenance on the route,” concessionaires on the corridor, the N3 Toll Concession, responded: “Our maintenance expenditure for 2007 was in excess of R300m.”