Eddie Cross's Website

The Strategic Nature of the Port of Beira

I have just visited the Port of Beira for the first time in 34 years. The City is still very underdeveloped and run down, but it has a population of 1 million and the Port itself bears no relation to the City - it is a large bustling complex with hundreds of long-distance trucks in queues and loading and unloading cargoes. It bears no resemblance of the Port that I visited in early 1987.

Mozambique became Independent in 1975 following the collapse of the Portuguese Government in Lisbon and the decision to withdraw from Africa. The Portuguese population of Mozambique and Angola packed up and left the countries, taking with them whatever they could salvage. They left behind a complete shambles, a handful of local graduates, a rundown infrastructure, and a civil war between the Rhodesian and South African backed Renamo and Frelimo, and the incoming administration led by Samora Machel and backed by Russia.

The Port of Beira was caught up in all of this. It had a long history of relations with the interior. In the late 1800dreds the Rhodesians tried to take it over by force, nearly succeeded and were then told to leave by the British Government. When Rhodesia was settled as a Dominion State in the Empire and Commonwealth, one of the first actions taken was to build a railway line to Beira in recognition that it was the shortest route to the sea. Beira became the major Port of access and departure for the new States in the interior. This was reinforced by the construction of a railway line to the Congolese copper belt in the north.

In 1965, the Rhodesians tried to sever their links to the UK and in 1966 the UN Security Council imposed sanctions on Rhodesia and the UK imposed a naval blockade of the Port. For the next 15 years the Port remained closed to the North where most of its cargo came from. After that, for another decade, the civil war effectively kept the border with Rhodesia closed.

I was CEO of a major Company in Zimbabwe, and we were exporting product to many parts of Africa and to Europe. We were forced to truck product from the northern parts of Zimbabwe to Europe via Cape town. Shipping was difficult and expensive, and I felt that we had to re-open our links to the sea via Mozambique. Sitting on a Commission to decide what Ports in South Africa would be developed to handle containers, also convinced me that the Mozambique Ports of Beira and Maputo offered us a lower cost trade route to South Africa, on which we depended almost 100 per cent for trade with the rest of the world.

I discussed this with private sector leaders and the Government and with their support we formed the Beira Corridor Group (BCG). Very quickly we recruited nearly 1000 companies to the cause, raised some money and started work. I travelled down to Beira and came back completely shell shocked by what I had seen. That year 500 000 of Mozambique's population had died of starvation. The image of walking skeletons remains with me today. The Port itself was derelict, broken-down warehouses, grass and even trees growing in the Port. The harbour heavily silted and empty.

The rail line was overgrown and unused, the road potholed and with vehicle wrecks on both sides, evidence of ambushes and conflict everywhere. I camped in a hotel where there was no water, doors removed and windows broken, food was scarce. The local currency completely worthless.

In the next three years we raised and spent US$700 million on the Port and its support infrastructure. Repaired and got the railway line working, dredged the Port and fixed its infrastructure, cleaned up the pipeline to Mutare and then extended it to Harare and by 1990, we had a third of all our imports and exports going through the Port. Our Government deployed 5000 troops to the Central Provinces of Mozambique and our political lobbying in the USA got them to recognise Frelimo and stop supporting Renamo. We showed the world what we could do when we mobilised our private sector.

I moved on in 1990 and had not been back until today. Next week they hold national elections and campaigning was in full swing. But what a great contrast to 1987, the currency is stable at about 65 to 1, food is plentiful and the streets abuzz with traffic. In my hotel the water was clean and hot, my hotel room spotless and serviced. But the biggest change was the Port itself, it was three times the size of 1990, clean and well managed. The harbour dredged to 12 metres and a new dredger at work in the channel. There were 25 vessels waiting to get into the Port, the place looked and felt like it was doing just what it is, handling record quantities of fuel and general cargo.

We still depend on the South African Ports to a great deal. However, this creates many problems - the South Africans operate a shipping cartel that provides southern Africa with shipping serves that are more expensive than they should be. The South African Ports are more distant than their Mozambique counterparts, often by hundreds of kilometres. Their Ports are congested and relatively inefficient. Transnet, the railway company of South Africa has virtually collapsed. Truckers from the northern land locked States all say they prefer using the Zimbabwean routes to the sea and the Mozambique Ports because in South Africa they are subjected to criminal gangs and Xenophobic attacks.

High bridging costs (the cost of getting our exports and imports to and from our clients), are a critical factor in determining our path to prosperity and growth. They increase the cost of everything we import and they reduce our income from everything we export. They undermine our ability to compete against those who produce the same things that we do. Simply switching from road to rail we could reduce the cost of basic foods in Zimbabwe by over 10 per cent.

As in so many areas, China and Japan have shown the way forward, they invested in their infrastructure and shipping. Chinese costs of transport and shipping from Shanghai to the United States are a third of what it costs us to get cargo to Durban in South Africa. Our railways do not work, our roads are generally run down and traffic slow, our border crossings are congested, and it takes weeks to get a truck from the Port to Katanga, now one of the most important hubs for metals and minerals in the world.

And it is not as if we cannot fix this situation, we already pay a high price for the inefficiencies and can easily afford to pay what it costs to fix the problem. All we need to do is get together and do what we did in 1987, put our collective shoulders to the wheels of this waggon load of opportunity and get it moving. Our Governments cannot do this. They are cash strapped and have little capacity to manage the process of change and development. If the private sector does not come to the party, there are no solutions except interventions by inefficient and often corrupt international agencies and foreign aid. We know where that gets us.

Beira shows us the way, but it is a lousy site for a Port and can never handle the volume of cargo that is required if we are to meet our goals. We need a new Port on the coast of Mozambique and new rail lines to service it. Sites are available and the Government of Mozambique is ready to facilitate its selection and development. The alternatives in Namibia and Angola are not as well located and would be costly to build and link to the interior. Our forefathers knew what they were doing when they built the rail lines to Beira and Maputo.

Eddie Cross
Harare, 5th of October 2024.