Against a background of immense challenges in the roadfreight industry last year, the groupage market bucked the trend and recorded significant growth – and more of the same is expected for 2018.
That’s according to NET Logistics marketing executive Kerry Craven who attributes the growth to a change in consumer behaviour in the southern African region – and Zimbabwe in particular.
“Where they used to perhaps buy a full load of 34 tons, consumers are now reducing their tonnages into a more manageable size, thereby increasing the volumes of consolidated loads,” she told FTW.
Thanks to this growth in demand NET Logistics has been operating five to six trucks into Zimbabwe per week and at least three a week into Zambia. And with monetary constraints likely to continue, she is confident of further growth in consolidations this year.
The positive outlook for commodity prices is adding further impetus.
“The rise in mineral prices in 2018 – projected by the World Bank – means that commodities exported out of Zambia and Zimbabwe will generate the muchneeded foreign currency that the mines in particular are looking for in order to regrow and strengthen their own industries.”
And while volume growth has been steady, it’s not all plain sailing. Problems at Zimbabwe’s border posts last year posed a major challenge for all transport operators. “We had to reroute a lot of our trucks via neighbouring countries,” said Craven. “Towards the end of the year, we had a major issue with the Asycuda system crashing, which affected the Christmas stock levels of all businesses in Zimbabwe,” she said.
“However, we have been assured that the new servers to rectify the problems will be in place by the middle of June and we are looking forward to these challenges being a thing of the past in 2018.” For the future, the company is set to grow its groupage services into Namibia, Botswana and Malawi, with Botswana a top priority.
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Consumers are now reducing their tonnages into a more manageable size, thereby increasing the volumes of consolidated loads. – Kerry Craven
