South Africa-based produce multinational Capespan has announced the formation of The Logistics Group (TLG) as an integrated logistics service provider.

Having invested heavily into its logistics operations over the last four years - including several acquisitions - the company will now group together its entire logistics infrastructure into a separately managed business.

The business will include port terminal operator FPT, commodity logistic operator Tradekor, service provider Port Stevedoring, its Mozambique operations MCT, and freight forwarding service provider Contour Logistics.

Tonie Fuchs, managing director of Capespan Group, said the company's global fruit production and marketing businesses remain the core focus within the organization, while its logistics businesses will be consolidated into TLG to ensure a "focus-based approach to
increased logistical service levels across a broader spectrum of product capabilities and capacity".

“The logistics business in TLG will continue to be managed by Capespan’s current logistics management team, led by retiring CEO Dawie Ferreira, who will be handing over to incumbent CEO Anton Potgieter over the next six months," Fuchs said.

Fuchs added that "significant steps" have been taken over the past few years to structure the company into two focused business units, with the global fruit business on the one hand and the logistics business on the other.

“We have now reached the stage internally where focusing on each business unit can be accelerated, and I am extremely excited about what lies ahead for both Capespan’s global fruit business as well as the logistics opportunities in TLG. 

"Fruit will remain a core logistical commodity for TLG, and we will always remain closely associated, but more focussed, business units within a larger group."

Ferreira and Potgieter said in a joint statement that the management team has been mandated to focus on the further expansion of TLG’s operational capabilities and capacity.

"Over the last few years, with the support of Capespan, we have radically transformed this logistics business unit into an integrated, multi-modal, multi-functional logistics service provider," they said.

TLG will include large-scale port and warehouse operations in the ports of Cape Town, Durban and Port Elizabeth, cross-country warehousing and loading terminals for bulk minerals and agricultural cargo, cross-border and warehouse operations in Mozambique as well as an early stage technology platform for the consolidation of road freight.