Elaborating on the infrastructural developments and world’s second fastest growing economy, the Supply Chain Africa Summit commenced yesterday at Hyatt Regency in Johannesburg. Themed under 'Africa's Supply Chain Technology Overview', this is the first conference on Supply Chain & Logistics held in the region. Chairing the conference and guiding the sessions on the first day was Brenda Horne Ferreira, CEO of SA Shippers Council & Founder of Maputo Corridor Logistics Initiative.

Inaugural session was delivered by Clement Manyungwana, Acting Deputy-Director General:Integrated Transport Planning at National Department of Transport, South Africa. Clement spoke on transport correlation with trade competitiveness and the upcoming transport plan vision with an example of North South Corridor. Day one, featured case studies by Garry Pita from Transnet Corporation & Sandile Ngcobo from eThewkini Municipality. They shared their insights on Transnet’s MDS procurement and implementation of category management respectively.

Additionally the attendees were adressed by Mark Kuipers, Chief Director from SCM Client Support National Treasury, Tarryn Daniels, Program Manager from GS1 South Africa, Basil Chinasamy, Supply Chain Expert and Barry Baetu, Managing Director from Harmonic Group. The day concluded with an interactive panel discussion on the functionality of procurement with adaptation of new developments and growing supplier relation function within e-commerce. Panel was led by Johnson & Johnson, Aveng Group, Nestle, SITA, Transocean, Nigeria & South African Supplier Diversity Council.

Second day of the conference started with plenary session conducted by Christine Msemburi, Executive Director at World Customs Organisation on innovative approaches to simplify the customs clearance process. Providing more details on customs policy, Beyers Theron, Head of Customs Modernisation Strategy & Design from SARS, South Africa expanded on how corruption and taxes borne by regional segmentation is affecting the country‘s performance.

Post luncheon, the summit will shift its focus to transport & logistics, strategic sourcing & procurement. The attendees will be apprised about upcoming transport modelling & projects, growing port hinterland connectivity and the need to analsye logistics trend to enable cross border & international trade boost. It will also discuss about BBBEE Standards and identifying procurement performance indicators. Day two will also have interactive panel discussion on inter-modal transport connectivity and discuss the challenges & trends of cross border logistics.

Sponsors at the conference include Indolex, Harmonic Group & St. John Group. The conference is also supported by The African Centre for Supply Chain, GS1 South Africa, The Supply Chain & Logistics Group, Global Logistics Associates, The South African Shippers’ Council, Maputo Corridor Logistics Initiative & Universal Freight Organisation.