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The Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi has ratified the concession contract for a second terminal at Port Said East Port, according to press statement by the Suez Canal Economic Zone Authority (SCZONE).
The contract was signed between Suez Canal Container Terminal (SCCT) and SCZONE in November last year on the sidelines of COP27 in Sharm El-Sheikh.
The SCZONE statement said the Cabinet approved the project in May 2023 followed by the Economic Committee of the Egyptian People’s Assembly in July.
In November 2022, SCCT had said in a press statement that the concession covers the financing, design, construction, management, and operation of a second terminal at Port Said East Port, which will be located between SCZONE and existing SCCT area.
Under the $500 million investment deal, SCCT will add an extra 955-metre berth and an additional 510,000 square metre (sqm) container yard to the already existing 2,400 metre berth and 1.2 million sqm yard, the statement noted.
Waleid Gamal El-Dien, Chairman of SCZONE pointed out on Wednesday that Port Said East Port, which receives nearly 80 percent of the total container transit trade in Egypt, was ranked 10th globally in the World Bank’s 2022 Container Port Performance Index (CPPI).
“We appreciate the strong collaboration between the Egyptian government represented by SCZONE, SCA [Suez Canal Authority], the governor, and all governmental authorities, and SCCT to develop a world-class terminal in Port Said and encourage more investment in Egypt through Maersk group,” said Steven Yoogalingam, CEO and Managing Director of SCCT.
Currently, the terminal’s annual throughput is four million TEUs, and the targeted additional volume after the expansion is two million TEUs.
SCCT, which opened in 2004 on a 49-year concession, is a joint venture with APM Terminals as the majority shareholder (55 percent) and operator, according to its website. Other key shareholders include COSCO (20 percent), the Suez Canal Authority (10.3 percent), Egyptian private sector (9.7 percent) and the National Bank of Egypt (5 percent).
(Reporting by Marwa Abo Almajd; Editing by Anoop Menon)
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