The award recognises innovative collaboration that transformed challenging export conditions into measurable performance improvements across South Africa’s agricultural value chain, as the industry prepares for its new season with 80mn cartons expected
The South African Table Grape Industry (Sati) and Transnova Africa have been jointly awarded a Platinum Award at the 2025 GIBS Logistics Achiever Awards.
The Awards were announced as the South African table grape industry is preparing to start its new export season, with around 80mn cartons of grapes expected to be harvested for shipment to destinations around the world.
In recent years, the Sati-Transnova Africa initiative was inspired by logistics problems in the port of Cape Town, which were harmful to smooth export operations.
The award recognises the pioneering work by the two companies in developing the Prescriptive Logistics Model that Sati has said is reshaping how the country manages fresh produce exports.
The Logistics Achiever Awards honour excellence and innovation in logistics and supply chain management, celebrating organisations that deliver measurable results through effective, sustainable, and world-class practices.
Sati said the Platinum Award, the programme’s highest honour, was presented for the innovative collaboration which helped transform one of South Africa’s most challenging export seasons into ”a story of innovation, resilience, and measurable performance improvement across the agricultural value chain”.
Mecia Petersen chief executive of Sati, said the award is a milestone that aligns with its broader objective to maintain and promote South Africa’s reputation as a reliable global supplier of consistent quality table grapes.
Sati first commissioned Transnova Africa to develop the Prescriptive Logistics Model in April 2024 as a proactive response to challenges experienced at the Cape Town Container Terminal, that led to significantly longer transit times for table grape exports.
Involving digital twin technology, the Prescriptive Logistics Model, the first of its kind in South Africa’s agri-export sector, digitally replicates the country’s export network to simulate real-time scenarios, optimise container allocation, and identify the most efficient routes to market.
Sari said that in phase 1, using digital twin technology, the model provided industry stakeholders with data driven insights into the 2023/24 table grape export season’s constraints and identified optimal strategies to mitigate challenges.
In phase 2, the model transitioned to a tactical planning tool for the 2024/25 season, providing fortnightly recommendations and risk scenarios that enabled growers and exporters to make data-driven decisions.
”It delivered actionable strategies to mitigate risks, align with market shifts, and optimise route-to-market plans, enhancing the industry’s global competitiveness,” Sati added.
