The Fridge Factory

Palfridge Limited, a manufacturer of domestic, commercial, and solar refrigerators, faces significant operational hurdles including customs inefficiencies between Swaziland and South Africa, high electricity costs and disruptions, and trade policy barriers. The company suffers from high import duties on European components due to Swaziland's failure to ratify an Economic Partnership Agreement with the EU and is currently barred from the Zimbabwean market. Additionally, the firm struggles with the retention of skilled local labor and has been forced to retrench workers due to rising business costs.

• Palfridge Limited faces financial and operational delays due to conflicting customs systems between the South African Revenue Services (SARS) and the Swaziland Revenue Authority (SRA), leading to penalties up to R10,000 and border delays of up to three days.
• High electricity rates and frequent power disruptions increase business costs and cause uncompensated damage to company machinery.
• The company pays higher duties on European components, such as specialized copper tubing from Italy, because Swaziland has not ratified the interim Economic Partnership Agreement with the European Union.
• Palfridge is unable to export to Zimbabwe despite complying with SADC rules, a situation that has persisted for over 18 months and resulted in forgone revenue.
• The firm struggles to retain skilled Swazi workers who leave for better-paying opportunities in South Africa, and rising costs of doing business led to worker retrenchments last year.

APA

South African Institute of International Affairs (2012). The Fridge Factory. https://saiia.org.za/saiia-toolkit/the-fridge-factory/

Chicago

South African Institute of International Affairs. The Fridge Factory. 2012. https://saiia.org.za/saiia-toolkit/the-fridge-factory/.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=South African Institute of International Affairs |title=The Fridge Factory |date=24 July 2012 |url=https://saiia.org.za/saiia-toolkit/the-fridge-factory/ |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{southafricaninstituteofinternationalaffairs2012fridge, author = {{South African Institute of International Affairs}}, title = {{The Fridge Factory}}, institution = {South African Institute of International Affairs}, year = {2012}, month = jul, url = {https://saiia.org.za/saiia-toolkit/the-fridge-factory/}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }