How congested are South African ports? Previously, we saw the situation at Durban Port.
The latest statistics show that as of November 30, the volume of container cargo stranded in the two major ports of Durban and Cape Town and in the open sea waiting to be berthed due to delays has far exceeded 100,000 containers, and the cumulative number of containers has been blocked. There are more than 100 container ships!
National logistics crisis
Recently, the South African Association of Freight Forwarders (SAAFF) released an open letter titled "Addressing Our National Logistics Crisis: A Message from SAAFF"!
In an open letter, the association highlighted: "Logistics bottlenecks in our ports
(Congestion) has reached a tipping point! This is a national logistics crisis ("National Logistics Crisis").
The South African Association of Freight Forwarders (SAAFF) also pointed out that port and railway operating company Transnet was one of the main causes of port congestion.
Transnet is currently actively seeking solutions to this severe situation and has planned to increase the container handling capacity of Terminal 2 from 2,500 containers/day to 4,000 containers/day in the next three months. Similarly, the handling capacity of Terminal 1 is also planned to increase from 1,200 containers per day to 1,500 containers per day.
Additionally, Transnet announced it was suspending cargo handling for trucks entering its Richard Bay port. Only trucks destined for designated ships will be processed and cleared as more than 100,000 trucks gather around South Africa's ports due to a backlog.
Currently, South African ports are working hard to solve the severe congestion problem at the Port of Durban. However, it is expected that the backlog of ships may not be cleared until February next year.
