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Borderless Alliance News, October 2014

IN-TRANSIT October 2014

⇒ Borderless Alliance Participates In First Ministerial Forum On

Sustainable Transport In Africa (ASTF) and SSATP General Assembly ⇒ Effects Of Current Development In Burkina Faso On Trade ⇒ Ebola Impact On Container Shipping

Authorities in Burkina Faso finally opened its bor-ders to Ghana after two days of closure. The action, re-sisting vehicular movements to and from the troubled country, caused huge dis-comfort to commuters and traders. The border was closed for two days following violent protests in Burkina Faso’s capital Ouagadougou on

30th October 2014 which compelled President Blaise Compaoré to resign. Ghana is however bearing the rippling effect of the disturbances, as trade here is being hampered. At the Tema port,

hundreds of truck drivers carting goods to Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger, told Joy News’ Kwetey Nartey they are scared of looting in the capital. Others say some destined warehouses have either been burnt or seized and that they have to wait for some weeks for the disturbances to die out. At the Paga border, the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) has a daunting task to clear a huge backlog of vehicles occasioned by the closure of the border, Joy News’ reporter in the Upper west region, Albert Sore reported. Chief Revenue Officer of the GRA, David Arthur said they were fortunate that the Burkinabe officials allowed pedestrian movement. But there is “a very huge [vehicular] backlog” and the Ghanaian authorities are “working feverishly to clear them,” he said. There is understanding for perishable goods and highly inflammable products like petrole-um that could cause explosion to be cleared first, he noted. Credit: Myjoyonline.com

EFFECTS OF CURRENT DEVELOPMENT IN BURKINA FASO ON TRADE

BORDERLESS ALLIANCE PARTICIPATES IN FIRST MINISTERIAL FORUM ON SUSTAINABLE TRANSPORT IN AFRICA (ASTF) AND SSATP GENERAL ASSEMBLY

Borderless Alliance, represented by its Execu-tive Secretary, participated in the first ever Ministerial Forum on Sustainable Transport in Africa which was held in Nairobi, Kenya from October 27 - 30, 2014. The Forum was a plat-form for African Stakeholders to collectively learn, share, and to self-initiate an action plan towards addressing congestion, reducing air pollution, climate emissions and improving road safety. The opening ceremony, which was jointly chaired by His Excellency Uhuru Kenyatta, President of the Republic of Kenya and Mr. Ban Ki-moon, Secretary General of United Nations, brought together more than one hun-dred participants, most of them coming from various regional economic communities, the United Nations Regional Office in Nairobi, the United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP), and the United nations Human Settle-ment Program (UN-Habitat). Others included government representatives, donor organisa-tions such as the World Bank, African Devel-opment Bank (AfDB), European Union (EU), Japan International Coorperation Agency (JICA), German and international development cooperation (GIZ), Agence Française de Dé-veloppement (AFD), Corridor Management Organizations and private sector organizations like. The three days forum identified priorities and

activities and emerged with roadmap from 2015 to 2018 to address challenges regarding sustain-able transport in Africa. These activities will, among other things focus on setting up of insti-tutions for the purpose of improving road safety in each country, collection and reporting of data, developing Non-Motorized Transport (NMT) policies and guidelines; reducing vehi-cle emissions while insisting on air quality monitoring in main cities and improving energy efficiency. These institutions will also ensure that vehicle import regulations be based on age, mileage, levels of emissions, and fuel economy policies. Other activities include ensuring ac-cessible and sustainable infrastructure including the adoption of national policy on urban transport, assessment and policy development of mass transit systems and multi-modal transport.

Also on the sidelines of the forum was the general assembly of the Sub-Saharan Africa Transport Policy Program (SSATP). The meeting offered participants the opportunity to review the Second Development Plan (DP2) ending in March 2015 and to submit to the Ministers the Third Develop-ment Plan (DP3) covering 2015-2018 with a budget of $2.7 mil-lion for the regional integration related activities. Activities to be covered by DP3 include three main pillars: effective policy and strategy formulation, sustainable regional institutions for inclusive policy dialogue and efficient lo-gistics services. The General As-sembly was preceded by the Transportation Coordination Committee of the Regional Eco-nomic Communities (REC-TCC) meeting that brought together RECs, Corridor Management Or-ganizations, regional industry associations such as Borderless Alliance and development part-ners. The REC-TCC main roles include Knowledge sharing and Coordination of Regional Integra-tion programs .

Participants at the forum

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Borderless Alliance News, October 2014

EBOLA IMPACT ON CONTAINER SHIPPING

EDITOR’S NOTE: In this issue, we republish, for the information of our members and partners, an analysis published in SeaIntel’s Sunday Spotlight of Octo-ber 19, 2014 – Issue 183, on the impact of the Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) on container shipment within the West African sub-region and the measures that have been adopted by various port authorities across the West African sub-region. We limit our republication to the current situation (with a few updates), port reactions and carrier reactions. The entire piece can be read on http://www.seaintel.com

The Ebola outbreak has so far not had any significant impact on container shipping in West Africa. The main challenges in Africa contin-ue to be congestion and poor infrastructure connections from the ports to their hinter-lands. The Ebola outbreak in West Africa was reported for the

first time in March this year and since then the WHO official death toll has increased to nearly 5000. The world has now begun to put a higher priority on the situation in West Africa. Some of the more recent devel-opments include the EU deciding to establish an air bridge to get aid into the most affected countries as quickly as possible, and the US and UK deploying troops to build healthcare infrastructure in Liberia and Sierra Leone.

So while the current Ebola Virus outbreak has already had devastating effects on West Africa, and could potentially lead to a global pandemic, we will in this issue of the Sunday Spotlight take a very narrow focus, and look at whether the Ebola outbreak in West Africa affected opera-tions within the container shipping industry?

In this analysis we focus on the reactions we have witnessed from carri-ers and ports and see how this has affected overall container shipping operations in the region.

The Current Situation: As at October 30, the UN Mission for Ebola Emergency Response (UNMEER) in their External Situation Report writes that “There have been 13,703 cases of Ebola virus disease (EVD), with 4,920 deaths, and suspected cases of EVD have been re-ported in six affected countries (Guinea, Liberia, Mali, Sierra Leone, Spain, and the United States of America) and two previously affected countries (Nigeria and Senegal).”In the same report, WHO Assistant Executive Director Dr. Bruce Aylward said that there had been a drop in the number of burials in Liberia and no increases in laboratory-confirmed cases. He cautioned that it was premature to draw conclu-sions, but appeared to be optimistic that the global effort to combat the outbreak was making headway.

The EVD outbreak in Sierra Leone is now present in all 14 of the coun-try’s districts. In the past few weeks, a surge in transmission has been taking place in the Western area, including the capital Freetown. It is now the district with the highest prevalence of cases (1,001).

Port Reactions : In this section we have chosen to focus on three cases to show some of the reactions we have seen from various port authori-ties in countries that are not heavily affected by Ebola. After an initial ban on all vessels from EVD-impacted countries, on August 10 the Cote d’Ivoire Port Health department imposed mandatory health checks

on all vessels that have called ports in countries affected by Ebola whilst at anchorage at Abidjan. This means that the Port Health depart-ment needs to confirm that all onboard are in good health before the pilot is allowed to board and bring the vessels into port. According to Hapag Lloyd the health department is only able to handle two vessels per day.

The Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority announced on August 30 that as part of their preparations for mitigation of the spread of Ebola, port users were directed to adhere to the following : all crew and passengers on board vessels should complete a health declaration form, all vessels that have called at Ebola-affected countries and vessels carrying Ebola suspects should remain at anchorage and not enter the port until de-clared safe by port health staff, and all shipping lines must provide nose masks, gloves and sanitizers on board on the gangway.

In Benin, the port of Cotonou announced preventative measures on September 11 which included all vessels calling at Cotonou being obliged to send a list of the 10 last port calls to port authorities three days before the vessel arrives. Similar procedures have been introduced by port authorities in San Pedro (Cote d’Ivoire), Lome (Togo), Luanda (Angola), Libreville (Gabon), Walvis Bay (Namibia), Matadi (Congo DRC), Pointe Noire (Congo) and Dakar (Senegal).

Carrier Reactions: With the Ebola outbreak, vessels calling the region are indeed facing increasing health and safety measures to prevent the spread of the virus. Therefore, some of the major carriers operating in Africa have adjusted their service network in order to continue to pro-vide effective and reliable port coverage. These include Maersk Line/Safmarine and CMA CGM/Delmas. Both Maersk Line/Safmarine and CMA CGM/Delmas have chosen to dedicate one service in their network to the most affected countries; Guinea (Conakry), Liberia (Monrovia) and Sierre Leone (Freetown). The only changes the carriers have made to the existing services are that Maersk Line/Safmarine has added Monrovia to the WAF7 service and removed Dakar in Senegal, which now is served through the WAF13 service, while CMA CGM/Delmas has added Conakry to the PC Nord service.

These changes have had no significant impact either on capacity to the Ebola-affected countries or frequency in terms of the ports called, which is very important in order to maintain the stability of cargo flows in and out of the countries. Furthermore, we have no information about serious incidents in the major ports in these countries. In Liberia, Maersk Line has not seen any changes to port operations in Monrovia, with no waiting time or congestion, and Maersk Line continues to serve the port with a fixed weekly call. According to Maersk Line’s local representative in Monrovia there are no major issues in delivering to the hinterland. There are quarantined zones and trucks are required to pass through checkpoints (with additional preventative measures), but deliv-ery is possible.

Another reaction we have seen from one of the smaller carriers in the trade to Africa, Hapag Lloyd, is imposition of an inspection fee sur-charge of USD 250/20’, due to the additional cost associated with the mandatory health checks before entering specific ports: e.g., delays, extra handling, speed-ups, etc.

Credit: SeaIntel maritime Analysis

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