Harare — The Beitbridge-Bulawayo Railway (Private) Limited (BBR) plans to launch a website that will allow customers to keep track of their cargo on a daily basis, thus increasing the reliability of freight movement, BBR chief executive Eitan Dvir said in Harare this week.

Dvir, whose company commissioned the $2,3 billion Beitbridge- Bulawayo railway line last year, said BBR was in the process of identifying a local Internet Service Provider to design and host the website, the first of its kind in southern Africa, within the next six weeks. "In order to increase efficiency, attract more customers and satisfy existing ones, we have decided to take advantage of modern technology, especially information technology, to introduce a new website," he told the Financial Gazette.

"We are now engaged in identifying someone who will work on the web site and I believe the service will be offered within six weeks." He said the company's decision to venture into the World Wide Web was prompted by a survey undertaken before the commissioning of the Beitbridge-Bulawayo railway line to find out what customers looked for in a freight service. The survey revealed that most customers regarded stability and predictability as the most important attributes in a railway line, followed by information that would enable them to keep track of their cargo.

Competitive rates and efficiency were ranked third and fourth respectively. In order to satisfy customers' need for information about their cargo movements, BBR's website will not only give details about the company, but will also enable its customers to keep track of their cargo. Each BBR customer will have a page on the website, which will be updated daily and will provide information on the location of cargo, enabling customers to determine if their goods are following set schedules.

Each company with a page on BBR's website will have a code that will enable only its officials to access these details, ensuring that cargo information does not fall into the hands of unauthorised individuals. Dvir said: "Customers will be able to log in every day and see the position of their cargo. Together with that, our customers will get, via e-mail, all the relevant information that will enable them to track their cargo.

"We are going to assign a specific person who will deal with updating the website on a daily basis."

He said although the concept of providing customers with online details on the movement of their cargo was new to Zimbabwe and the region, BBR would be using already established channels to actually gather the information. Freight trains keep in frequent contact with railway offices on a daily basis, enabling railway lines to collect information on freight movements, which is used to determine if schedules are being met and is also passed on to their accounting departments. But Dvir said until now, no railway company had made it a practice to distribute the information to its customers so they also could be kept informed about the movement of their goods.

"Most of the railway lines get information regarding their wagons and their movements in the past 24 hours," he said.

"They have this information, but they are not distributing it. I believe that once we embark on our service, it will not take long for the whole industry to try to offer the same service."

It was important for customers to be kept abreast of the movement of their goods because it enabled them to plan more effectively, thus saving money.

For example, if customers had cargo that had to be transported by rail to a port where it had to be loaded onto a ship and they knew from tracking it through the Internet that it would be delayed, they would make alternative plans for its shipment.