Private aid for freight lines, port services

Transnet is pushing ahead with plans to boost private participation in SA’s ports and freight-rail networks as the state-owned logistics company’s operational performance deteriorates.

By the end of October it plans to create an infrastructure manager to allow private companies to run trains on key freight tracks, minister in the presidency Khumbudzo Ntshavheni said, in a statement on Tuesday. Those rail lines move cars, metals and coal to ports and import fuel and automotive parts.

The company also expects to form partnerships with private operators at the Durban Pier 2 Container Terminal, part of Africa’s biggest container port, and at the Ngqura Container Terminal in the coming months.

The drive to increase privatesector investment in SA’s logistics and power industries comes as government struggles to arrest the declining performance of its state-owned companies and deliver basic services to citizens.

The government is also helping Transnet to seek additional locomotives and is pushing law enforcement agencies to reduce the cable theft that hampers sections of the Container Corridor, which carries goods to and from the port at Durban, and Gauteng.

Ntshavheni also said a Water Partnerships Office had been established in the state-owned Development Bank of Southern Africa to boost private participation in water re-use, wastewater treatment, desalination and sanitation projects. She said that more than 10,000MW of private power projects were now in various stages of development

“These reforms are necessary both to address the immediate challenges that we face, and to drive a fundamental transformation of our economy in the months and years to come,” she said./