Mail & Guardian
Ash Muller
09 October 2026
Passenger recovery, cargo growth and a new strategy could unlock billions in airport development
ACSA is investigating a Midfield Cargo development at OR Tambo, reported elsewhere at a project value of around R5.7bn, split between aeronautical infrastructure like taxiways and apron space and non-aeronautical infrastructure like warehousing, with construction potentially running for more than four years.
It’s sitting in ACSA’s “feasibility portfolio”, meaning it’s being studied rather than committed. But ACSA’s results presentation projects that cargo volumes across its network could reach 1.24 million tonnes by 2029/30 — roughly two and a half times this year’s volume of just over 500 000 tonnes — driven by pharmaceuticals, e-commerce, aerospace parts, perishables, diamonds and metals and automotive components. For a city the size of Johannesburg, cargo growth on that scale needs warehouses, cold-storage facilities and logistics parks built close to a runway. OR Tambo is the obvious place for a developer to look...
