The ports of Cape Town and Saldanha Bay on Wednesday became the latest to go live with the Transnet National Ports Authority’s (TNPA’s) new R79-million Web-based Integrated Port Management System (IPMS), first introduced at the pilot site, the Port of Durban, in July.

IPMS replaced manual processes and enabled key port operations to be managed online and in real time across TNPA’s eight commercial ports.

All vessels arriving at the two Western Cape ports between August 26 and 31 would be allowed priority registration, provided vessel agents were trained. Other Cape Town and Saldanha vessel agents would be able to register on the system as and when they were ready to transact.

Since being introduced in Durban, over 108 vessel agents had been registered onto the IPMS and 135 vessel arrival notifications had been processed within the first three weeks.

TNPA CEO Richard Vallihu said the online system would help to transform the country’s ocean gateways into ‘smart ports’, by using advanced information technology that would make them more intelligent and sustainable, while conserving resources, time, space and energy.

“Global ports are adopting ‘smart port’ concepts and the world is increasingly embracing digital technologies and data analytics to make sense of the information that we have around us.

“As TNPA, we believe the glue, or the backbone of our entire port system is information systems, but in an integrated way, where we manage just about every input and output to make monitoring, tracking, evaluating and optimising a lot simpler,” he commented.

Developed by Navayuga Infotech, a company based in India, in collaboration with its South African partner Nambiti Technologies, the IPMS was a strategic project that aimed to support the broader objectives of the Transnet's Market Demand Strategy, in terms of efficiency and productivity.

TNPA had invested around R79-million for the entire system across all eight South African ports, covering concept development, architecture, implementation and roll-out.

Vallihu said the IPMS had been benchmarked against Malaysian and Singaporean ports, which were among the world’s most efficient.

The IPMS would also be introduced at the Port Elizabeth, Ngqura, East London, Richards Bay and Mossel Bay ports.