Migrating freight from road to rail remains the cornerstone of State-owned railways utility Transnet Freight Rail’s (TFR’s) Market Demand Strategy (MDS). However, it also offers considerable opportunity for greater intermodalism, TFR's Molatwane Likhethe said during a recent presentation at a Transport Forum held at the University of Johannesburg.

He stated that TFR had embarked on an MDS, the drivers of which were economic growth, job creation, regional integration, the road-rail freight industry imbalance, reducing logistics costs, meeting customer demand and improving service delivery.

Likhethe believes that developments in intermodalism are an answer to the success of the MDS drivers.

Developments included those in technology and infrastructure; transport handling, such as bulk mineral mining commodities being increasingly containerised; partnership trends, such as increased public–private partnerships within the rail sector; foreign investment; collaboration across the supply chain; and rail freight volume trends that were increasing in Brazil, Russia, India and South Africa.

Likhethe acknowledged that, while Transnet was a monopoly, it was important for the company’s success to work with all partners in the supply chain, customers, clients, suppliers and the general public.

TFR had started to embrace concepts of partnerships and collaboration, and believed that consulting was important for success.

He noted that, to make rail an enabler, TFR needed to work with all partners.

“Road-to-rail migration is critical. To harness rail service offerings, we embarked on a corridor development of terminals and hubs, customer siding development and management, customer loading and offloading equipment, logistics skills development, real estate development facilities, infrastructure maintenance and development, as well as Web-based customer interfacing,” he explained.

Likhethe added that intermodal terminals would promote efficiency and reduce logistics costs and that further development among hubs, rail and ports would improve integration and service to customers.

TFR was embracing intermodalism, modern-ising its rolling stock, upgrading and expanding its network, understanding its customer requirements and building further collaboration opportunities, as well as enhancing customer service in terms of repeatability, consistency and predictability.

Likhethe referred to TRF’s procurement of locomotives from other countries, stating that if there was a shortage of skills in South Africa, Transnet needed to “open the opportunities to everyone”