Is Transnet's reefer trains pilot just another road to nowhere?

Failures in both broader public policy, State capacity, and the appetite within Transnet have forced goods and services on to South Africa’s road network. But the trouble with developing sound public policy interventions is that they often devolve into talk shops, round tables, position papers, and slide packs writes Andrew Ihsaan Gasnolar.

Public policy interventions within the public sector are often riddled with red-tape. And recently in South Africa, with extensive graft and incapacitation within the public sector this has been exacerbated and in part, collapsed. Transnet — like much of South Africa — has suffered under a decade of lost opportunity, State Capture, and missteps. Companies such as Transnet have a crucial role to play in driving economic opportunity and in role modelling and developing catalytic development, particularly within the realm of infrastructure, technology, and on a more basic level — moving goods and providing services across South Africa, as well as creating opportunities on the African continent.

The state of South Africa’s road infrastructure has been adversely impacted by the country’s inability — particularly in the case of Transnet Rail — to provide a reliable and secure network to move goods and services across South Africa.

Simply put, failures in both broader public policy, State capacity, and the appetite within Transnet have forced goods and services on to South Africa’s road network. A missed opportunity to drive local beneficiation, efficacy, and securing the supply chain, which has all adversely impacted economic opportunity and growth. But the trouble with developing sound public policy interventions is that they often devolve into talk shops, round tables, position papers, and slide packs. The only way to force an alternative and a more effective outcome is to be intentional about driving impact and ensuring that best practices and implementable solutions are on the table.

Once the fundamentals are sound and focused on measurable outcomes, that is when the hard work of implementing the great ideas and doing the actual work needs to happen.

The recent shifts within Transnet are a very minor step in the right direction where its port terminals and freight rail divisions are going to attempt to work together to pilot inland operations in Cape Town. The modal shift from road to rail is crucial as it will alleviate pressure on the already congested and fragile road network, but it will also create efficiencies and scalability for the entire supply chain.

However, piloting solutions are never sufficient, and this modal shift will require a fundamental rethink around the efficacy of how Transnet operates both externally and internally.

South Africa’s public policy positions are often touted as sound with the lamenting commentary that those policies fail because there is a lack of State capacity.

Unfortunately, within the realm of freight, South Africa needs to do the hard work of modelling real implementable policies that harvest private sector involvement, best practice, beneficiation across the value chain, and driving efficacy. At the heart of it, Transnet Freight Rail must be far more ambitious in expanding the notion of a pilot project of moving reefer containers by rail with select clients.

The intervention must focus on how South Africa can leverage its existing rail infrastructure, create more competition, or demand on that network, and crucially expand that market to drive economic activity and technologic catalytic developments.

- Andrew Ihsaan Gasnolar