DeloPorts to invest 5 bln rbl into deep-water berth at KSK

NOVOROSSIYSK, Apr 30 (PRIME) -- Russian stevedore company DeloPorts plans to invest 5 billion rubles in expansion of its grain terminal KSK by 1.5 million tonnes, including through construction of a 40A deep-water berth that starts in June–August, DeloPorts CEO Igor Yakovenko told reporters on Tuesday.

“Expansion of capacities of KSK (encompasses) investment of about 5 billion rubles, half of which, or about 2.7 billion rubles, will be spent on the onshore part, and water engineering accounts for the remaining part. We will start construction of another deep-sea berth at the KSK grain terminal this summer, it will be a 40A berth with a depth of 16.9 meters so that we can service the ships with a deadweight of 100,000 tonnes,” he said.

The company plans to finish construction in 26 months or faster, and the investment would allow KSK to raise its grain transshipment capacities by 1.5 million tonnes to 6.5 million tonnes until 2021. The company plans to spend its own funds and a credit line subsidized by the Agriculture Ministry.

Yury Matviyenko, CEO of container terminal NUTEP owned by DeloPorts, told reporters that DeloPorts plans to launch deep-sea berth number 38 at NUTEP in July–August. The berth will allow NUTEP to service the ocean-class ships with a capacity of up to 10,000 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) and to double the terminal’s capacity to 700,000 TEUs.

After the launch of the berth, DeloPorts plans to attract ocean services of Denmark’s Maersk to NUTEP. “There are several lines and services working here in Novorossiysk, and we suppose that some services will switch from other ports to us and will work constantly, it is about Maersk in the first place,” he said.

In the southern basin, the container market should not grow more than 3–4% in 2019, and the company is working on the way to load the capacities with containerization of grain being one of them.

“We are also looking at other types of cargoes, including transshipment of grain and fertilizers…and out-of-gauge cargoes, as Ro-Ro ships are in great demand now in both ferry transportation and in car transportation. We are studying this and we are preparing our ferry terminal for a greater traffic,” Matviyenko said.

(64.6917 rubles – U.S. $1)

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