Cape Town importers and exporters are suffering at the city’s port because of congestion, which first reared its head with the start of the pandemic but has intensified since December.
During Transnet’s financial year ended March 2021, the port handled 374,640 containers used to export agricultural goods, citrus and deciduous fruit valued at almost R130m.
Mike Walwyn, SA Association of Freight Forwarders maritime affairs director and Cape Town Port liaison forum chair, tells the FM that local importers and exporters have lost hundreds of millions of rands because of the congestion.
Exporters Club Western Cape chair Terry Gale says that since the pandemic began in 2020, port congestion has been an issue because of the restrictions. "Covid [worsened] the situation because the lockdowns closed the port for two or three months. The government allowed only essential goods to pass through — everything else came to a halt."
Walwyn says Covid also changed global shipping patterns radically. "There are fewer vessels and containers around, which disrupts global supply. As a result, freight rates have shot up."
Wanda Augustyn, spokesperson for Vinpro, which represents about 2,600 wine producers, tells the FM that the local wine industry faced major challenges when moving its exports through the port.
"There is a challenge to get empty bulk containers in time. Shipping companies prioritise fruit over wine because it is the peak fruit season.
"This results in shipping companies letting wine exporters know at short notice that no space is available," Augustyn says.
The industry is looking to ship wine in alternative cargo containers and to export through Durban, Port Elizabeth or even Walvis Bay.
"The challenges may be with us for a few more months," Augustyn says.
Walwyn says the weather is the main reason for the recent intensification of the port backlogs.
Transnet Port Terminals spokesperson Mbali Mathenjwa and Transnet National Ports Authority spokesperson Ayanda Mantshongo say the weather usually results in 39 days of port downtime every year during the April to October fruit season. "This is due to fog, underwater currents and wind speeds exceeding 90km/h, which make it unsafe for the terminal to operate," they say.
During December 2021, the high wind caused 135 hours in lost port time and a City of Cape Town power cut resulted in 28 hours of downtime, Transnet says.
It says the weather and power cuts resulted in a backlog of nine vessels on January 18. By early February, six ships needing to offload at the Cape Town container terminal were at anchor.
Adding to the port delays, Walwyn says, Transnet granted more annual leave to its staff over the festive season than usual, resulting in a staff shortage from mid-December to mid-January.
"Absenteeism and staff on sick leave and annual leave were at unacceptable levels during December, exacerbated by Covid," Hortgro, which supports deciduous fruit growers, writes on its website.
According to Gale, another critical factor contributing to congestion was evidence that during Brian Molefe’s tenure as Transnet CEO, the parastatal diverted funds meant for repairs and the upgrading of equipment at local ports.
"So for seven or eight years under our previous president [Jacob Zuma] a minimum amount of port maintenance happened," Gale says.
This legacy of poor maintenance haunts the Cape Town port today.
Adding to the picture, Hortgro writes that the port’s ageing infrastructure and equipment faces pressure from local fruit export volumes that have increased significantly over the past five years.
Walwyn says the port also has equipment issues. "There is a constant breakdown of port equipment and a shortage of key items."
Transnet says turnaround times for delivering imported spare parts to the container terminal from Europe average 14 weeks.
The terminal has 23 rubber-tyred cranes in operation, and for another eight, the delivery of spare parts is awaited.
"You have ship-to-shore-container cranes, which lift containers on and off ships.
"The port has eight. It would normally have seven operational and one on maintenance. In the past couple of weeks six have been operating," Walwyn says.
Transnet says seven ship-to-shore-container cranes are operating, and the delivery of hoist motors for one crane has been awaited since December 2021.
Walwyn says the loss of ship-to-shore-container cranes means that only two of the three container ship berths are operating. In addition, the productivity of these cranes at the port is low.
Transnet says the terminal averages 18 gross crane moves per hour compared with a target of 24. However, Walwyn says that at a meeting one of the shipping lines indicated that Transnet achieved only 10 to 15 moves an hour per crane. "So, relative to the optimum, you can see how much longer it will take to offload a ship," he says.
The congestion has also hit the truck companies that remove cargo from the port.
"When the port is working, a truck company can get two or three trips a day to move cargo from it. Now it is lucky if it makes one trip a day.
"That has a significant impact on its operations and profitability," says Walwyn.
"This has resulted in a build-up of trucks in the port and the surrounding roads."
Walwyn says the port has rightly pointed out that port users should use the night shift more. "But many businesses say that to use the night shift, they need to employ more people and pay overtime. So is it worth their while?" he says.
Mathenjwa says most port users use the terminal from 6am to 10pm. "The terminal is engaging industry to capitalise on the underutilised night shift," she says.
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