Trade and industry minister, Ebrahim Patel, says jobs are a huge concern but that South Africa needs to get on the road to a greener future. It's high time because Naamsa has reported the fourth monthly decline in vehicle sales.

Days after Naamsa announced the fourth consecutive monthly decline in vehicle sales - heavily affected by the logistical nightmare at the country's ports and freight rail networks, which it said is having a devastating impact on the automotive value chain - the Department of Trade, Industry and Competition (DTIC) has finally released the Electric Vehicles White Paper.

Blaming the delay on the need to weigh up the impact on the labour market - it will inevitably entail job losses and require reskilling - DTIC Minister Ebrahim Patel said it wasn't a simple matter.

"What do you do with the more than 100,000 service station attendants and mechanics? Because we don't control technological development, and it may be that everybody ultimately ends up charging their cars at home... so it's (about) managing those transitions.

"But the line of march can't change. If we get stuck in a high-carbon emission world, then there's nothing to look forward to in future. So we must make this transition."

The white paper, he said, is an "instrument" in the roadmap that includes the National Treasury's plans to implement tax and expenditure measures to support the motoring industry's transition to new electric vehicles (NEVs, which...