The committee of the South African Institute of Materials Handling (SAIMH) aims to reverse the trend of constantly declining institute membership by actively running training workshops and lectures to educate members and people who are new to the industry about the industry.

According to SAIMH chairperson Adi Frittella, the institute had about 500 individual members and about 50 corporate members in the early 2000s, when it encompassed all disciplines within the sphere of 'materials handling', compared with 66 individual memberships and 11 corporate members currently.

An initial slump in membership resulted from the division of the institute into Unit Handling and Bulk Handling with the Unit Handling disciplines forming part of the Logistics unit, while Bulk Handling members were retained in the SAIMH.

The loss of membership has continued since then, he says. SAIMH treasurer and tutor Bruce Watts adds that another cause of the decline in membership is that people are now using the Internet as an alternative to individual interaction to get technical information. Read More...