Chamber awards exporters

FOR over a decade, the Durban Chamber of Commerce and Industry (DCCI) has collaborated with Transnet Port Terminals (TPT) to highlight successful exporters in KwaZulu-Natal.

Each year, the programme culminates in the KZN Exporter of the Year Awards gala dinner at which the winners are announced. This year the awards were held on 29 October at Sibaya. The keynote address was by Mr Zama Gwala, CEO of Trade and Investment KwaZulu-Natal (TIKZN), and Mr Richard Jacob, CEO of Hulamin, was the guest speaker.

This year’s finalists and winners in the Emerging category were Rocket Works (Pty) Ltd (winner), with Pakco and SBS Water Systems (Pty) Ltd as finalists.

In the small business category, winner was Dick Whittington Shoes (Pty) Ltd, and Mexan Products (Pty) Ltd and Kagiso Interactive were finalists.

In the medium category, ND Engineering was the winner, and finalists were Anderson Engineering Food and Chemical Equipment and AJ Charnaud and CO (Pty) Ltd.

In the large business category, the winner was Ferro South Africa Ltd NCS Resin Coatings, and finalists were Futura Footwear Ltd and Sumitomo Rubber South Africa.

Mediterranean Shipping Company (Pty) Ltd was the winner in the service provider category, with finalists DAL Agency and Triple S Shipping.

In the Africa category, winner was Futura Footwear Ltd and finalists were Sumitomo Rubber South Africa (Pty) Ltd and Inhep Electronics.

The winner of the special BBB-EE award was Pakco and the winner of the sustainability award was Imperial Armour Winner.

Dumile Cele, CEO of DCCI commented: “We celebrate and attempt to encourage exports out of KZN. The KZN economy needs to improve as it is currently faced with imports that are higher than it exports, making KZN a market for other countries to benefit, while we remain a follower on the world economic stage.”