Maritime transport policies of the republic of South Africa since 1994 : challenges and opportunities for the next twenty years

Abstract

Paper presented at the 33rd Annual Southern African Transport Conference 7-10 July 2014 "Leading Transport into the Future", CSIR International Convention Centre, Pretoria, South Africa.

This paper looks at maritime policies adopted by the government of the Republic of South Africa in the past twenty years and considers how comprehensive and effective were these policies in meeting the socio-economic objectives of the democratic state and in particular whether these policies have been successful and therefore resulted in the growth and development of the industry. The paper makes a point in that, for the fact that maritime transport is international in nature the standing of the Republic in comparison to its trading partners specifically in maritime services and equipment has been insignificant over these years. The paper calls for the adoption of further policy and strategy measures that are more robust. The country has to revamp the manner in which maritime transport domain is regulated and managed within government. By default this paper also highlights the reduced significance that maritime transport industry has endured in South Africa over the last 20 years, despite several policy attempts to increase the understanding of its worth to the South African economy. This situation is largely due to the fact that, from a governance point of view, some critical maritime responsibilities are fragmented between various government departments.