Although State-owned Transnet is on the mend, rampant theft and vandalism continue to cripple all of South Africa’s key infrastructure sectors, not just rail, posing a grave threat to the economy and demanding widespread intervention, Business Unity South Africa (Busa) transport and logistics focal area senior executive Ian Bird said last week.

Speaking at the 2025 Coal & Energy Transition Day, in Johannesburg, he called for coordinated national action to address what he described as a far-reaching and systemic crisis.

“This is a socioeconomic challenge in the country. It’s not only limited to Transnet. The mines, the telcos and Eskom are all suffering from this vandalism and theft, and that needs to be addressed,” he said.

Bird outlined both the progress made by Transnet in improving freight rail volumes and the persistent challenges that continue to undermine national logistics performance.

He cautioned that, while Transnet’s performance had stabilised somewhat, the broader system remained vulnerable and erratic owing to widespread infrastructure sabotage, underinvestment and technical failures.

“All three of these matters disrupt the system and naturally bring down performance. The decline in Transnet’s performance has definitely been arrested, and the turnaround is, we believe, sustainable,” he said.

He noted that Transnet’s total freight volume had reached 161-million tonnes for the 12 months ending March – an improvement of 6% over the previous year. However, the company fell short of its target of 170-million tonnes.

“There remains a gap. Sure, nine-million tonnes is a lot of tonnage, but it’s incremental in terms of what the system is actually capable of and, more importantly, what the economy requires. So there remains a challenge,” Bird said.

He noted that Transnet had moved beyond its emergency “recovery plan” and was now “operating under a corporate plan,” indicating a more stable strategic framework.

He said the improved export coal figures to Richards Bay were one of the more promising indicators. Bird cited volumes of 54-million tonnes for the past year, up 11.5% from the year before, noting that the current target for 2026 was 63-million tonnes.

“Projections at the moment are slightly lower than that, but still not significantly lower. So we are envisaging around a 58-million- to 60-million-tonne performance for the current year. Again, we can say it’s incremental, but it’s a 10% improvement,” he said.

Much of the progress, Bird said, stemmed from better transparency and cooperation.

“Clearly, it's been [a result of] a change in management, which happened in October 2023 and, more formally, in January 2024. But critically, there's been a degree of transparency over the last 18 months – in terms of operations, in terms of challenges, in terms of solutions, and in terms of a willingness to work together.”

Business leaders, including major exporters, have been working closely with Transnet under the National Logistics Crisis Committee, creating what Bird described as a “cadence” of meetings and action plans. These included operational excellence centres, corridor recovery teams, and joint interventions for derailments and network failures.

However, persistent instability in the system continued to undermine progress, he lamented.

“It is a conveyor belt of sorts. It absolutely needs a rhythm to operate and the Transnet management team needs that rhythm to generate the results we’re looking for.

“When your locos are failing, when there are problems on the track with signalling, with rail breaks, and security incidents, those three factors are significant disruptions. We challenge any management team to get into rhythm . .  after such disruptions,” he said.

To build resilience, Bird said Busa and its partners had focused on three main intervention areas: funding for network restoration, support with locomotives and tackling security risks.

“Active work is being done on that. Transnet has come up with some really great models around how the private sector can invest,” he said.

However, he noted that security remained a major concern.

While expressing cautious optimism, Bird reiterated the scale of the challenge ahead.

“We are seeking 3% economic growth. That number came out of the partnership between business and government as an aspirational number, but it requires a turnaround more significant than what we are currently seeing in logistics, in loadshedding, and in crime and corruption,” he said.

Despite progress, Transnet’s full recovery is far from complete.

“The ‘bounce-backability’ – if there is such a word – is critical, because when the system goes down, it needs to come back immediately. Otherwise, those hours are lost,” he said.