Forecasting South African containers for international trade : a commodity-based approach
Date
2011-11
Authors
Havenga, Jan H.
Van Eeden, Joubert
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
AOSIS OpenJournals
Abstract
The most common approach used internationally for forecasting international trade
containers is models based on the correlation between container trade and economic
growth. While the strong historical correlation is indisputable, this paper argues that
there will be saturation in the propensity to containerise as all the suitable volumes of
the underlying commodities shift to containers over time. In addition, the link between
freight transport and GDP will decouple as more sustainable approaches to economic
development, and therefore freight transport, are necessitated by economic and
environmental realities. A commodity-based model, taking into account the underlying
drivers of containerisation, is proposed here as a more realistic forecast of container
demand. This could have a material impact on how large-scale investment decisions are
directed.
Description
The original publication is available at http://www.jtscm.co.za/index.php/jtscm/article/view/72
Keywords
Containerization -- South Africa -- Forecasting
Citation
Havenga, J.H. & Van Eeden, J. 2011. Forecasting South African containers for international trade: a commodity-based approach. Journal of Transport and Supply Chain Management, 5(1): 170-185. doi: 10.4102/jtscm.v5i1.72 .