SABIE - A hammer blow has struck the small forestry town with the announcement of the proposed closure of one of the country's largest sawmill operations.
The shutdown of Tweefontein Sawmill, which is owned by the Hans Merensky Trust, will deprive Sabie of its second largest employer with the loss of more than 600 jobs. The mill only just survived the devastating forest fires in August 2007.
CEO of the trust, Mr Chris Pienaar, says the decision is subject to compliance with labour legislation.
"Current market conditions, combined with the cost of raw material, for which we are dependent on Safcol/Komatiland, have made this process necessary. In addition, the recent damaging fires in the Komatiland plantations have reduced the availability of saw logs to a level where Tweefontein Sawmill can no longer be operated at capacity."
Pienaar gave the assurance to all stakeholders that efforts over the years to obtain an owned plantation asset that is  large enough to supply the mill with appropriately priced saw logs,  has proved  unsuccessful.
The closure follows on the cutbacks and redundancies by York Timbers that recently declared a R200 million loss.
The timber industry has been in the doldrums for nearly two years following the low demand for timber in the global recession and collapse of the South African building boom.
Mr Leslie Mudimeli, corporate spokesman for Komatiland told Lowvelder that discussions had taken place between senior executives of both companies. "The aim was to protect jobs but inevitably all mills and plantations are maximising their resources during hard times," he said.
Pienaar said they were mindful of the impact of such a decision on all employees at Tweefontein.
"If no other option is put forward in the consultation process with employees, the inevitable outcome will be the closure of the sawmill. We are committed to treating all employees with dignity and according to their conditions of employment and relevant provisions of applicable legislation."
Following a successful history over 29 years, a closure would be a most unfortunate outcome.
The mill has less than 20 houses in Sabie that were made available to certain employees as part of their salary package. Mr Henry Sandilands of Coet-lands Property said that a decision about the houses had not been made by management.
"At this moment these houses are not up for sale and we are awaiting management's decision. In the light of the current economic climate there are already a couple of houses up for sale but we are concerned for when the supply exceeds the demand."
Shops and restaurants are bearing the brunt of a drop in spending. The town’s largest restaurant, Spur, closed its doors six months ago.
Sabie Primary School will also be negatively affected if a majority of its pupils were to leave. The principal,
Mr Wynand Groenewald said that
23 pupils of the total of about
400, would have to leave.
"This will be a major blow for us. Already about one classroom will leave and if this continues it will affect the number of teachers we can have on the staff. But we are looking into the matter and will handle it positively. We will just have to tighten our belt and see this through."
It is unfortunate that the town will not be able to sustain itself by means of the tourism industry.
Mr John Theunissen of Trips SA says Sabie does not have the pull for the domestic market. "It was incredibly quiet during the Fifa World Cup. There was nobody in the town and very few visitors. The World Cup period did us no favours and South African tourists simply went elsewhere."
The mill is currently looking at viable alternatives with the help of CCMA, unions and other role players. According to current planning the mill will close in phases over a period of two months from August to September as production departments finish their last assignments.