Private train operating companies (TOCs) will start carrying freight on South Africa’s government-run mainline rail network as early as this year.

The Transnet Rail Infrastructure Manager (Trim) confirmed on 13 May that it had concluded rail access agreement with 11 TOCs. According to Engineering News, the TOCs are expected to add 24 million tons of freight capacity across the coal, manganese, container, fuel and general freight segments.

Transnet CEO Michelle Phillips said the conclusion of the agreements was a milestone in the state-owned enterprise’s vision of an open-access rail system.

The 11 TOCs allocated slots are ARC South Africa, Barberry, Grindrod, Interlinks, Iracema, Menar, Minrail, Motheo Logistics, Sharp Logistics, the Railway Corporation and TLD Marine.

‘This milestone represents more than just slot allocation, it signals the creation of a functional and competitive rail marketplace,’ Trim CEO Moshe Motlohi said.

He said while the TOCs would be operating at their own risk on a network that had been neglected, Trim was working on improving the signalling and the general state of the network.

The Department of Transnet is considering allocating more slots on the network to private operators in line with the goal of raising freight rail volumes to 250 million tons by 2030, from below 180 million tons.

Trim has also launched an ad hoc slot allocation platform, to assign additional rail capacity outside the annual allocation cycle.

19 May 2026
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