Ports offer a strategic competitive advantage to a coastal country's economic development. They are in effect, the lungs of the economy. Restrict the efficiency of a maritime country's ports and you restrict the level of growth and economic efficiency of that country. Efficient ports are catalysts, facilitators and attractors of international seaborne trade. It is encouraging, therefore, to see that the new "cosmos" system [fully computerised container terminal management system -based on the port of Rotterdam model] is already yielding productivity gains (notwithstanding initial teething problems) after one of the fastest implementation times in the world for this type of system.

The vision that the ndot has for South African trade is one where our ports can permit the unhindered flow of goods through them at the lowest practical cost to the nation and with as much private sector participation as possible preferably without government subsidies being applied.

The traditional role of ports is changing quite rapidly as we advance into the new millennium. A quick glance at the top 100 container ports in the world shows how few are comprehensive ports [a comprehensive port is one where both port authority and port operation functions within the port are performed by the port authority, either public (as in South Africa) or private (as in Felixstow) as opposed to landlord ports where the port authority is primarily the landlord and port operations are provided by a combination of private and public operators that lease land and/or infra- and superstructure from the authority].

Our guess is that even 2 decades ago, this picture would have looked very different. This shows quite clearly that governments have placed the provision of port services in the more agile hands of the private sector, and rightly so.

Source: http://www.transport.gov.za/