Africa is the new growth
market for mining.
That’s the view of Hilton
Tait, managing director of FT
Global Logistics, who believes
the opportunities lie beyond South
Africa’s borders.
“Unfortunately the South African
mining industry is still recovering
from industrial action and financial
results illustrate that we are in for a
few lean years,” he told FTW.
A division within the First Tech
Group of Companies, FT Global
Logistics is heavily involved in the
mining sector – from trade finance
and procurement of raw materials
to freight forwarding, customs
clearance and delivery to site.
“We are seeing a number of
emerging mining groups involved
in projects and starting to do largescale
exploration,” he told FTW.
But the continent does have
its challenges. “The road
infrastructure in northern Zambia
and the DRC leaves a lot to
be desired. There are still too
many delays at borders and
complicated paper trails. This
leads to congestion at border posts
and long transit times. The nature
of the export markets has also
caused problems,” Tait told FTW.
“Flows aren’t balanced so you
have periods where hauliers don’t
have return loads and are therefore
reluctant to load from South Africa
to places like the Copperbelt. The
return loads can be seasonal, based
on agricultural products that are
being exported through South
Africa.”
He said further north, problems
existed in both Dar es Salaam and
Mombasa. Port congestion remains
an issue and some shipping lines
have changed schedules to get
better economies of scale by using
hub ports to combine both South
African and European or Far East
loads in order to reduce the number
of vessels calling at these ports.
“While it makes economic sense
to carriers it has pushed out transit
times and made planning a lot
more difficult,” said Tait.
What is just as unfortunate, he
said, is that South African mining
groups seem to be lagging in
developing into Africa – specially
in the light of the aggressive
developments from both Australian
and Canadian operators.
“We as a group are having to
market ourselves to companies
based outside of South Africa
which makes our selling difficult
but we are assisted by high costs
of sourcing goods and logistical
issues if the goods are imported
from these areas. South Africa has
an advantage with its technical
know-how and reliability of
supply.”
According to Tait, South African
mining companies need to be more
aggressive in terms of exploration
and mining development.
“There are risks attached to these
investments but generally speaking
long-term returns are good. Other
South African companies will
also benefit from the spin-off
expenditure and support systems,
while the freight companies and
transporters can benefit from
supply services and possible two-
way logistics solutions."
CAPTION
Hilton Tait … ‘Still too many delays at
borders and complicated paper trails.’
