The blossoming economy in Morocco is presenting opportunities for port investment, and officials are hoping good news could spur up to $8 billion in new port infrastructure.
Moroccan Minister of Equipment, Transport and Logistics Aziz Rabbah told a delegation that Moroccan port authorities are allowing public-private partnerships to speed up investment in Morocco’s ports, Port Technology reported. Rebbah noted investors would see relatively attractive returns on investments in Moroccan assets.
“We want to be much more competitive and speed up investment,” Rabbah said. “We want to move from the traditional model of state funding to private investments via PPPs.”
The $8 billion would mostly benefit the ports of Tanger-Med and Casablanca, which are both expanding container work. At Casablanca, the port is adding a third container terminal with new cranes and rubber tire gantries.
Moroccan ports could, for the time being, also benefit from added cargo diverting from the Ebola-stricken countries of Liberia, Nigeria, Guinea and Sierra Leone. Though carriers haven’t openly boycotted the ports, the added security and delays could result in ships bypassing the ports all together.
DHL recently called Africa the world’s “last growth frontier,” noting that at no time in recent years has there been as much optimism about the various opportunities for businesses in Africa.
Morocco isn’t the only West African country that is eyeing expansion. A Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority official said this summer that Ghana’s ports of Tema and Takoradi could potentially handle a combined 1 million TEUs a year. The official said estimates show that volume could double by 2028. Both ports are currently under construction with expansion projects, which include dredging work that will deepen the ports to allow for larger vessels.
Kenya Ports Authority Chairman Danson Mungatana warned that if the majority of African ports don’t continue to upgrade, they could miss out on the spoils of maritime trade. Mungatana was cited by the African newspaper, the Star, noting that big-ship calls could pass African nations by if the infrastructure doesn’t support them.
“The steady increase in ship sizes coupled with growing cargo volumes has put pressure on cargo infrastructure and terminal capacities the world over, (and) in particular for African ports which have capacity constraints and poor transport infrastructure connectivity,” Mungatana told the two-day East Africa Transport Infrastructure Conference at the end of August in Nairobi.
The east coast African port of Mombasa is also working on a dredging project, but right now the port is only able to handle ships with capacities of up to 4,600 TEUs.
Contact Corianne Egan at cegan@joc.comand follow her on Twitter: @CEgan_JOC.
