About Us

Financial impacts in the industry:

The Industry is affected by numerous cost increases including fuel prices, the Road Accident Fund levy and the Carbon Tax. Delays at ports and border posts have a significant impact on logistics costs. Additional costs include vehicle tracking and tracing systems, warehousing and distribution operating costs, municipal charges, escalating electricity costs, costs of compliance with legislation and standards and a proposed waste tyre recycling levy. Variable costs, or costs that can be controlled and reduced by operating and maintaining the vehicle professionally, represent 55% of a vehicle’s total operating cost.

The industry ecosystem:

The Road Freight Industry ecosystem continues to focus on business development support as a means of providing sustainable economic growth and support to SMEs. However, SMEs in the Road Freight Sector remain significantly underrepresented. This is exacerbated by the shrinking SME growth rate and a high SME failure rate.

Infrastructure challenges expected:

The challenges posed by transport infrastructure, technology advancements and the ever-increasing demands of compliance and increasing operational costs call for the Road Freight Industry ecosystem to help grow and advance SMEs within this sector, in order to boost social economic growth in the country and create employment.

Success factors driving SME growth:

Success factors for SMEs depend upon various dynamics and it is essential to identify success factors driving SME growth within the Road Freight Industry, taking into consideration the geographical context to improve the success rate and sustainability of SMEs across vertical sectors and industries. Understanding success and challenge factors unique to ED and SD in the Road Freight Industry is critical to help improve the success rate of SMEs, thereby helping the economy of South Africa grow.

What are the critical success factors:

The critical question is: what are the critical success factors that contribute to SMEs in the Road Freight Industry and how can the various business development support facilitate growth? The Road Freight SME Summit is a business development initiative aimed at addressing success and growth matters relating to Road Freight SMEs building sustainable businesses. It’s a platform designed to facilitate growth through a strategic partnership between corporate enterprise and supplier development programmes, as well as communication and co-operation between SMEs within the Industry.

What is the SME Road Freight Summit for?:

The Road Freight SME Summit is a platform designed to unpack the various challenges and possible solutions to improve the success rate of SMEs in the Road Freight sector. The Summit endeavours to improve support given to SMEs in the Road Freight space, so as to ensure the design of effective intervention and support programms which will enable SME growth.