Nelson Mandela Bay Business Chamber CEO Denise van Huyssteen says the Chamber is working with the Municipality to do everything possible to mitigate the risks on its members associated with extreme loadshedding.
Van Huyssten says one such example is the 24 hour voluntary loadshedding intervention plan which allows qualifying manufacturers to shed for 24 hours in a row, instead of at 2.5 hour intervals, as this is less disruptive to production processes.
"Longer-term, we have a renewable energy cluster in place, which comprises participation of some of the biggest manufacturers in the Metro. Once operational, the cluster in two years time could potentially and subject to the buy-in of key stakeholders, result in reducing at least 3-4 stages of loadshedding for the Metro as a whole," she said.
Van Huyssteen said the Chamber is willing to work together with all key stakeholders to urgently develop and implement innovative solutions which can assist to save investment and jobs in Nelson Mandela Bay.
"This is not the time for finger-pointing but rather should be about all of us putting our energy into finding solutions which can make a difference."
She also called on Eskom to urgently address their inefficiencies and operating costs, and develop and implement a rescue plan to get South Africa out of this very serious electricity crisis.
"It is simply not tenable for manufacturers to have their power constantly switched on and off as their production processes are not set up or designed for this," she said.
"In some instances there are certain manufacturers who have still not been able to start up their operations this year, while others can't meet export requirements, and also in many cases product is being scrapped and machinery is breaking down."
