Every day, around 1 000 trucks cross the border from South Africa into Mozambique, headed for the port of Maputo. It’s a journey that saves up to two weeks sailing time to markets in the Middle East and beyond, but the relatively short 100 km drive to the coast typically takes as long as 12 hours. The trucks, laden with commodities such as chrome, magnetite, and citrus fruit, then spend as long as six to eight hours just crossing the border and dealing with customs procedures.
The carbon dioxide and other exhaust fumes emitted in the crawling traffic are terrible for the local environment as well as the climate, and the lengthy process is torture for the drivers of the trucks. While toilet facilities exist near the border, most drivers are reluctant to use them for fear of losing their place in the 40 km queue and enduring an even longer wait.
Skip the queue, save time, save money and lower your emissions
Some drivers are lucky, however. A few kilometres before the jam starts, there’s a new road heading to an alternative crossing facility run by The Logistics Group, a South African logistics company, supported by the European Investment Bank Group through its nearly $75 million investment in the funds of Africa Infrastructure Investment Managers, a fund manager based in Cape Town. There the formalities take just 45 minutes, and goods are transferred onto trains headed directly to Maputo, allowing the trucks to skip the trip to the coast entirely.
“You don’t need to park your truck, you don’t need to get out, and you don’t need to fuss about with papers,” explains Anton Potgieter, chief executive at The Logistics Group. “You just head down our private road, pull up to the booths, get your documents stamped, unload and then we do the rest.”
The time savings at The Logistic Group’s facility in Ressano is enabled by technology. CtrlFleet, The Logistics Group’s in-house tech company, has developed software that allows fleet owners to book, track and perform invoicing, as well as an app for drivers that allows them to store, sign, and upload documents, and communicate directly with fleet controllers.
As well as saving time, the facility helps customers save money and reduce their carbon emissions in two ways. First, by loading cargo onto trains for the last leg of the journey to Maputo, the emissions from that tortuously slow journey are avoided entirely. Second, TLG offers flexible, reusable ‘bladders’, similar to the pouches used in supermarket wine boxes, that can transport any liquid commodity, so that trucks don’t waste their return journeys by driving back empty.
Investment with a difference
To support companies like The Logistics Group whose projects are contributing towards the European Union’s policy goals in regions like Southern Africa, the European Investment Bank invests in impact funds with experience and expertise on the ground
“If you want to make things happen on the ground then the thing you need is equity. That’s what makes things happen,” says Gergely Horvath, an investment officer at the European Investment Bank. “But to do it, you need to work with fund managers who are good at spotting the right opportunities and entrepreneurs who need equity to grow.”
Africa Infrastructure Investment Managers, with which the European Investment Bank has worked since 2008, is one such group. The bank invested an additional $30 million in the firm's funds in 2024 through the Emerging Market Climate Action Fund, a €500 million fund of funds set up together with Allianz Global Investors. “One of the things about The Logistics Group that was compelling to us was their experience in developing technology for more efficient logistics management, particularly on securing backhaul efficiency,” says Ed Stumpf, investment director, at Africa Infrastructure Investment Managers. “Trucks driving back empty after delivering their cargo is a major source of carbon emissions in South Africa. Trucks leave the mines loaded and then come back completely empty. It’s a real waste. The Logisitics Group’s technology helps to avoid that.”
Made in Taiwan
By investing in targeted funds with experienced managers, the European Investment Bank can help further the European Union’s policy goals with partners around the world.
Through its $100 million investment in Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners’ Global Markets Fund II, for example, the Bank is helping to develop the offshore wind power industry in emerging markets. The European Investment Bank and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners have built a partnership spanning nearly a decade, beginning with the Bank's initial investment in the investment manager’s Flagship Funds I (2015) and III (2017) - that allowed the European Investment Bank to invest in Taiwan’s first offshore wind project.
The Danish fund manager’s Changfang-Xidao offshore wind park, situated 11km off the West Coast of Taiwan and completed in May 2024, is expected to provide almost 600 MW of power once fully operational. The project, which will provide enough clean energy to power around 650 000 households and reduce CO2 emissions by 1.1 million tons a year, will boost the island’s offshore wind generation capacity by 25%.
A key feature of the project, is its collaboration with local companies, making it the most Taiwanese project in the country’s offshore wind industry. While Danish wind turbine leader Vestas has provided the 62 turbines for the project, the ‘jacket foundations’ anchoring the turbines to the seabed were supplied by Taiwan’s Century Wind Power.
Since entering Taiwan in 2017, Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners has been working to develop local supply networks on the Island, an issue of strategic importance given the heavy weight of mainland Chinese companies in the sector.
