Rampant Copper Wire Thefts Incur Massive Losses to Public Utilities

SEATTLE (Scrap Monster): Many countries within the Southern African Development Community (SADC) have reported alarming rise in copper cable theft incidents.

As per estimates, copper cable thefts have caused loss of $3.7 million to Zimbabwe Electricity Transmission and Distribution Corporation (ZEDTC) - the country’s power utility during the first ten months of 2018. Also, Telone -the leading telephone service provider has reported loss of over $1 million on account of theft of telephone cables during the previous year. It is under these circumstances that Jorum Gumbo, the Minister of Energy and Power Development called for serious stakeholder engagement to effectively tackle the menace, in curtailing losses to public entities.

The country had put into force rigorous punishments including 10 years prison term for anyone caught with copper cable and forfeiting of vehicles or houses found with suspected copper cables. Despite this, the country has reported no respite in copper cable theft incidents.  

Gumbo announced that the Ministry will come up with more concrete steps and actions to deal with the issue. The security of transformers and other infrastructure needs to be improved, he said. Also, Gumbo called for imposition of harsher sentences for those involved in copper cable thefts and necessary changes in legislation. The use of latest technologies such as IoT will also help to track thefts in a more efficient manner, he added.

Other utilities including South Africa’s Eskom and Namibia’s Telecom have also reported huge losses on account of copper cable thefts in 2018.