Frans Cloete Quotations

If a substantial proportion of the 80 000 Taxi Recap vehicles due for delivery over the next five years is to be reported in the MCV segment, we could be in for even more spectacular growth in the overall over-3 500 kg GVM market.

The sales total of 2,028 units reported to the National Association of Automobile Manufacturers of South Africa (NAAMSA) during December, pushed the year's sales volume to a final grand total of 27,413 units, which was second only to the previous all-time record of 30,742 units that had been established in 1981.

By the end of October, the cumulative year-to-date total of 22 732 units has already overtaken, by 32%, the highly celebrated result of 20 814 unit deliveries achieved during the corresponding period in 2004 which was, in itself, a post-1982 record for the market.

The major objective of the truck supply industry at the present time is focused on the provision of a satisfactory level of support infrastructure to ensure that the vehicles required by operators can be processed for delivery in the shortest possible time, and are then also fully supported in terms of parts, service and repairs once they have entered service.

This welcome recovery in HCV sales indicates a far more progressive approach towards fleet management in the very important distribution sector of our economy.

While the MCV return equals the second-best ever monthly result for this segment achieved in May 2005, it was only 40 units below the outright record of 1 216 units set in June, and sustains the tremendous growth spurt being exhibited by this vehicle classification. In their own right, the HCV and EHCV segment results both set new records for these categories since NAAMSA redefined its truck market segmentation parameters at the beginning of 2004.

The even spread of the growth across these groupings is pleasing evidence that fleet expansion and renewal in the industry is wide-based, after a period in which these activities had been heavily biased towards the heavier end of the market.

The South African truck market, coming off the back of an outstanding 2005 annual result, has continued to achieve impressive monthly returns in both December and January, notwithstanding the fact that these two months normally deliver the lowest total new vehicle sales volumes of the entire calendar year. The main driver of January's excellent result was a strong surge in HCV segment sales, with this grouping of predominantly distribution trade vehicles now returning to market share levels above 20% for the first time in nearly half a decade.

The upturn in MCV sales, which first became apparent around the middle of 2004, is clearly the driving force behind the market at present.

Ever since the turn of the Millennium, we have experienced consistent, and sometimes spectacular growth across our market. Even the difficult period experienced with the foreign exchange value of the Rand in the second half of 2001, with its push-on affect in the interest rate arena, did not reverse the trend, and now that we have experienced more than three years of currency robustness, price stability and a positive financing scenario, the results can speak for themselves.