The Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport South Africa (CILTSA), brought warehouse leaders, technology specialists and supply chain professionals together in Johannesburg on 9 July for its 2026 Warehousing Conference. The event explored how digitalisation, technology and artificial intelligence can turn warehouses into high-performance distribution engines.

Under the theme ‘From Warehouse to High-Performance Distribution Engine, Driving Efficiency through Digitalisation, Technology and AI’, delegates examined the commercial, operational and safety foundations required for resilient logistics operations. It convened decision-makers from across warehousing, transport, technology and services. Mihlali Gqada, Freight Specialist at the Department of Transport, directed the programme.

Mihlali Gqada, Freight Specialist at the Department of Transport 

“This conference put practical collaboration at the centre of the conversation,” commented CILTSA President Elvin Harris. “Our sector can strengthen South Africa’s supply chains when we connect people, data and operational discipline, then turn insight into sustained action.”

Warehouses As a Strategic Engine

Clayton Thomas, Managing Director of Industrial Logistic Systems, opened the half-day programme by setting out why warehouses have become essential to national supply chain resilience. “Good enough no longer carries an operation through rising customer expectations and network pressure,” Thomas pointed out. “Every warehouse has an opportunity to become a responsive distribution engine that protects service, strengthens resilience and creates value.”

Clayton Thomas, Managing Director of Industrial Logistic Systems 

Brian Mudhokwani, Chief Operating Officer at ISB Optimus, focused on the three performance gauges of cost, throughput and accuracy. He encouraged delegates to measure a priority metric with greater rigour and use the resulting insight to guide improvement. “The warehouse is an engine, and cost, throughput and accuracy are its instrument panel,” Mudhokwani said. “Choose one gauge, measure it properly and use that evidence to improve the decisions your team makes every day.”

Brian Mudhokwani, Chief Operating Officer at ISB Optimus

His presentation addressed the value of disciplined warehouse management systems, quality data and connected planning. It also highlighted practical applications for AI, including pick-path optimisation, slotting decisions and predictive insights embedded in workflows.

Flow, Safety and Connected Intelligence

Gerhard van Zyl, Group Operations Director at Professional Group of Companies, examined tactical flow and floor control. He showed how walking, waiting, searching, rehandling and queueing can erode productive time across a facility. “Warehouses achieve more when they design for movement and remove friction,” van Zyl said. “The key question for leaders is why work stops, because every interruption adds cost, absorbs capacity and affects the customer promise.”

Gerhard van Zyl, Group Operations Director at Professional Group of Companies

Greg Naicker, Vice President Operations at Powerfleet, connected safety performance with productivity, uptime and delivery reliability. His session demonstrated how real-time visibility, operator and asset guardrails, AI video and integrated dashboards can identify emerging risks and support proactive decisions.

“Safety data becomes operational intelligence when leaders can see risk patterns across the warehouse, yard and road,” Naicker said. “Connected systems give teams the chance to prevent disruption, protect people and sustain reliable delivery.”

Greg Naicker, Vice President Operations at Powerfleet

The conference closed with a shared commitment to stronger, data-led warehousing capability across South Africa. Delegates left with practical priorities for improving visibility, controlling flow, strengthening safety and building dependable performance.

“CILTSA will continue creating forums where the profession can exchange expertise and advance the capabilities that modern logistics demands,” concluded Harris. “The energy in the room showed that our industry is ready to build smarter, safer and more connected operations together.”

The event was powered by ISB Optimus and Powerfleet and captured expertly by Tendai Mhlanga Photography.

For further information about CILTSA and its professional events, please contact CILTSA.

From L – R: Clayton Thomas, Greg Naicker, Mihlali Gqada, Gerard Van Zyl and Brian Mudhokwani

Spend a morning around Gqeberha’s industrial areas and you’ll quickly notice the constant movement of trucks, containers and delivery vehicles. Components arrive at manufacturing plants, finished products leave distribution centres and freight moves steadily between warehouses, factories and the port.

Most of that activity happens quietly in the background, yet it’s one of the reasons Gqeberha has remained one of South Africa’s most important manufacturing and logistics hubs. While the city’s port and automotive industry often receive the spotlight, warehouses are the link that keeps everything connected.

They’re where products pause briefly before moving to the next stage of the journey, helping businesses manage inventory, support production and keep goods flowing across the country and into international markets.

Keeping Production Moving

Few industries illustrate the importance of warehousing better than automotive manufacturing.

Companies such as Volkswagen Group South Africa and Isuzu Motors South Africa rely on thousands of components arriving from suppliers throughout South Africa and abroad. Those parts don’t move directly from a truck onto an assembly line. They pass through warehouses where they’re received, checked, organised and made available exactly when production requires them.

The timing matters. If a critical component isn’t available when it’s needed, production can slow down or even stop. Warehouses help prevent those interruptions by ensuring parts are in the right place before they’re called for, allowing manufacturing to continue with as little disruption as possible.

More Than Somewhere to Store Stock

The idea of a warehouse filled with rows of products waiting to be collected no longer reflects how many modern facilities operate.

Walk through a busy warehouse today and there’s constant activity. Deliveries are arriving, products are being inspected, orders are picked, pallets are wrapped and trucks are loaded for the next destination. In some facilities, goods spend only a short time inside before moving on again.

That pace reflects the way supply chains have changed. Businesses want inventory that keeps moving, not stock that sits idle. The warehouse has become an active part of the supply chain, helping businesses respond more quickly to customer demand while maintaining greater control over inventory.

Why Gqeberha Makes Sense

Location has always influenced where businesses choose to invest in warehousing, and Gqeberha offers several advantages.

The city connects manufacturers with the Port of Gqeberha, national road networks and customers across South Africa. Agricultural products from the Eastern Cape, imported goods arriving through the port and locally manufactured products all move through the city’s warehousing network before continuing their journey.

For many businesses, that proximity reduces unnecessary handling, shortens transport distances and creates greater flexibility when demand changes.

Quietly Supporting the Local Economy

Warehouses don’t only support manufacturers. Retailers, food producers, distributors and exporters all depend on facilities that can receive goods, manage inventory and dispatch orders efficiently.

Whether it’s automotive components heading to an assembly plant, citrus from the Sundays River Valley preparing for export or consumer products making their way to retailers around the country, warehouses play a part in keeping those supply chains moving.

It’s a role that often goes unnoticed because, when everything is working as it should, the warehouse simply becomes another link in a much larger network.

Behind every container leaving the port, every truck departing a distribution centre and every product arriving on a shelf is a warehouse that helped make the journey possible. It may not be the most visible part of Gqeberha’s logistics industry, but it’s undoubtedly one of the most important.

As SAPICS celebrates 60 years of impact in 2026 under the theme “Legacy to Leadership: 60 Years of Connection, Collaboration & Transformation,” South African supply chain executives face an urgent call to action.

With soaring road freight volumes, warehouse occupancies topping 85%, and compounding rental hikes, local leaders rushing to automate frequently fall into a costly trap. While modern warehousing technology can greatly assist in slicing operational costs and slashing inventory losses, investing heavily in off-the-shelf systems without addressing underlying operational bottlenecks often amplifies the chaos rather than solving it.

True leadership requires recognising that technology is not a standalone silver bullet; transformation happens when advanced process design meets a flexible, digitally prepared workforce.

Why More Technology Doesn’t Always Mean More Progress

When margins shrink, the instinctive corporate reflex is to slash headcount or purchase an automated tool because a competitor did. However, automating a broken process simply yields an automated mess.

“A lot of technology is available off the shelf, and it is dangerous to buy something you don’t thoroughly understand,” warns Willie du Preez, Managing Director of Programmed Process Outsourcing (PPO). “If you don’t understand where your operational bottlenecks are, you will introduce the wrong technology.“

Du Preez notes that real return on investment (ROI) stems from a deep diagnostic phase. This means utilising industrial engineering to map workflows and eradicate systemic friction before buying hardware. Without this groundwork, companies end up with fragmented patches instead of a unified ecosystem, losing critical institutional knowledge.

Furthermore, traditional data tracking compounds this vulnerability. “After-the-shift or month-end information has become obsolete,” Du Preez stresses. “We need real-time data frameworks to make decisions proactively before bottlenecks disrupt the entire chain.“

The Business Case for What Doesn’t Appear on the Balance Sheet

Optimising a warehouse requires looking far beyond obvious hardware and immediate software implementation costs. True operational leadership requires a comprehensive evaluation of regulatory complexity, strategic risk, and financial agility.

“When an organisation conducts a deep cost-benefit analysis, the ‘invisible’ levers of outsourcing become undeniable,” explains Jeandie Leone, Commercial Executive at Workforce Staffing and Outsourcing. “A strategic partner doesn’t just manage transactional headcounts; they absorb significant balance-sheet liabilities. For instance, compliant employers in South Africa must navigate complex regulatory requirements, spending 1% of payroll on Skills Development Levies and up to 6% on continuous training. In outsourcing key components of your workforce, these administrative and training burdens shift entirely to the expert partner.“

Leone emphasises that this strategy fundamentally transforms how human capital impacts corporate finances. “Labour is traditionally one of the highest flat operational expenses (OpEx) for most logistics businesses, yielding zero return on scorecards. Outsourcing allows companies to route this heavy spend through a fully compliant partner, converting a standard operating cost into powerful preferential procurement spend for their B-BBEE scorecard.“

Furthermore, Leone highlights immediate cash flow advantages. “In high-volume environments, managing internal payrolls places immense pressure on working capital. Partnering with an provider that offers standard 30-day payment terms effectively allows a business to defer massive payroll expenses for that period, interest-free. This frees up vital cash flow to reallocate into core technological infrastructure.“

The Strategic Power of Operational Convergence

Even with engineered processes and real-time dashboards, technology remains inert without the people trained to pilot it. In South Africa’s high-attrition warehousing environments, the traditional model of renting generic labour on one side and managing operations on the other is no longer viable. To maintain operational continuity and protect margins, supply chains must merge Temporary Employment Services (TES) and Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) into a singular, symbioticoperating model.

“The relationship works best when both parties are intertwined within the exact same operating solution for the client,” explains Quintus Sliep, Managing Director of Worldwide Staffing. “The TES partner delivers workforce agility by sourcing, onboarding, and scaling compliant personnel as volumes shift. Concurrently, the BPO partner injects the process structure, productivity metrics, and management control that allow that workforce to perform properly.“

When these two disciplines operate in isolation, operations fracture. Integrated, the client receives a scalable solution that maintains strict process discipline during volatile demand spikes.

Leone concurs, adding a regulatory and risk perspective: “Outsource partners bring dedicated legal and operational expertise needed to handle industrial relations, recruitment pipelines, and time and attendance. This ensures absolute continuity, leaving the client’s internal teams free to focus strictly on macro supply chain strategy.“

Bridging the Digital Skills Gap

This integrated approach is critical to addressing one of the industry’s most pressing operational challenges: preparing workers for increasingly digital environments. In modern, data-driven warehouses, traditional once-off classroom training is no longer enough. Software platforms evolve continuously, compliance requirements shift rapidly, and scanning and automation systems are updated in real time.

“We shouldn’t talk about automation or robotics purely as job threats; they support people rather than replace them completely,” says Sliep. “The bigger risk is the skills gap between where operations are going and where the workforce is today. The TES provider must prepare people for the environment, and the BPO must manage that environment so workers can use technology productively.”

Closing this gap requires ongoing collaboration between workforce enablement and operational management. Together, TES and BPO partners create continuous learning environments that equip workers to adapt alongside technology rather than be displaced by it. The result is a more resilient, digitally capable workforce able to engage confidently with evolving systems, workflows, and operational demands.

Operational resilience depends on aligning technological progress with human capability. As du Preez concludes, “Technology alone does not drive transformation; people and their knowledge do.”

Willie du Preez

Quintus Sliep

Jeandie Leone