{"id":849755,"date":"2026-02-04T15:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-02-04T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=849755"},"modified":"2026-02-04T14:02:00","modified_gmt":"2026-02-04T12:02:00","slug":"major-own-goal-for-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business\/849755\/major-own-goal-for-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"Major own goal for South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Persistent operational failures at the Port of Cape Town have become a major own goal for South Africa\u2019s export economy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Hortgro, the fruit industry has lost about R350 million this season due to operational issues at the Port of Cape Town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hortgro is the grower-funded organisation that represents the South African deciduous fruit industry (pome and stone fruit).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It facilitates research, technical innovation, market access, and transformation to support sustainable, profitable, and globally competitive fruit production in South Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The organisation said<\/a> delays at the Cape Town Container Terminal have forced exporters to reroute shipments at additional costs, while thousands of containers remain in cold storage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The port was ranked among the world’s worst-performing ports in 2024, and Hortgro is contemplating legal action against Transnet to recover losses and push for urgent improvements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By the second week of the season, Hortgro noted that fruit exports were down 9%, inspections increased by 37%, resulting in a backlog of around 1,688 containers and putting an estimated R1 billion worth of fruit at risk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Speaking on The Money Show<\/a>, Jabu Mdaki, chief executive of Transnet Port Terminals (TPT), acknowledged that the port has endured \u201ca challenging period over the last few months and weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He added that weather-related stoppages have significantly escalated the challenges. He noted that from November through January, the port lost about 915 hours due to extreme wind conditions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is compared with about 479 hours during the same period the previous year. \u201cSo that\u2019s a 91% increase in terms of the hours that we have lost to wind,\u201d Mdaki said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He added that this has made it impossible for the terminal to work when the wind is quite high, which has impacted its ability to service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mdaki stressed that it is not only the frequency of disruptions that has worsened, but also their severity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Mdaki, the port has experienced wind speeds reaching levels that effectively shut down operations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe are seeing 120km\/h winds, so it\u2019s quite high, and it makes it impossible to continue with the operations,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He explained that while Transnet invested last year in new rubber-tyred gantry cranes capable of operating in winds of up to 90km\/h, \u201cunder the conditions that we are experiencing, even those new RTGs will not be able to operate.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The impact on exporters has been severe, particularly for industries dependent on tight shipping windows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Transnet is working closely with the affected sectors<\/h2>\n\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/a>
Jabu Mdaki, chief executive of Transnet Port Terminals <\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Mdaki said Transnet has been forced to work closely with affected sectors to limit the damage. \u201cWe are working very closely with the industry to look for solutions and to coordinate our efforts,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the key contingency measures has been diverting vessels away from Cape Town. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere have been diversions of the vessels to our Eastern Cape terminals, which are Ngqura Container Terminal and the Port Elizabeth Container Terminal, and that has served us quite well,\u201d Mdaki said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, Transnet has focused on squeezing as much output as possible from clear-weather days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mdaki added that TPT has stepped up coordination with industry stakeholders, holding \u201cweekly updates with the industry\u201d and working closely with the Container User Forum to benchmark global best practices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Looking ahead, he said Transnet remains committed to Cape Town despite its exposure to wind. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe have invested quite extensively in this port,\u201d Mdaki said, pointing to accelerated plans to replace ageing ship-to-shore cranes. He said once newer cranes are in place, Transnet can begin exploring remote operations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe take the operator of the machine, and then we are able to operate remotely, especially when it\u2019s high wind, because it can be quite challenging for the operator to be up there under those conditions.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Operational failures at the Port of Cape Town have become a major own goal for South Africa\u2019s export economy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":92,"featured_media":849760,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872],"tags":[2279,24669,853,2138,24668],"class_list":["post-849755","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-cape-town","tag-hortgro","tag-south-africa","tag-transnet","tag-transnet-port-terminals-tpt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/849755","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/92"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=849755"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/849755\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":849766,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/849755\/revisions\/849766"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/849760"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=849755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=849755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=849755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}