MAERSK's standalone port operator APM Terminals and Colombia's port operating company, Compania de Puertos Asociados SA have finalised a deal to form Cartagena Container Terminal Operator (CCTO).
The joint venture will manage and operate Compas SA's existing multipurpose facility in Cartagena on Colombia's Caribbean coast.
APM Terminals will hold a 51 per cent in the operation, which includes annual throughput capacities of 250,000 TEU and 1.5 million tons of general cargo.
"We are proud to expand the APM Terminals global terminal network into this important South American market in partnership with such a highly respected business as Compas SA," said APM Terminals CEO Kim Fejfer.
CCTO and Compas SA will jointly invest over US$200 million in upgrading and expanding the facility to triple the annual throughput capacity, and enable the terminal to handle vessels up to 13,000 TEU capacity which will be able to transit the Panama Canal after the lock-widening project is completed this year.
Cartagena, located at the northern tip of South America on Colombia's Caribbean coast, is the second-busiest container port in South America, and the fifth-busiest in the Latin American/Caribbean Region, with a throughput of over two million TEU in 2015.
The Colombian economy is the third-largest in South America, after Brazil and Argentina, and has averaged better than a four per cent annual growth rate since 2010. The IMF to expand by 2.9 per cent in 2016 has projected the Colombian economy.
A recent World Bank report has noted that Colombia's population of 47 million, the second-largest in South America, has seen the poverty rate decline from 49 per cent in 2003 to 21.9 per cent in 2014.
Increased trade opportunities resulting from port and transportation infrastructure investment and improvement will help to continue to drive Colombia's economic expansion and social progress.
CCTO is the sixth operational Latin American facility within the APM Terminals global terminal network, which includes ports in Callao, Peru; Buenos Aires, Argentina and Santos, Pecem, and Itaja's Brazil.
APM Terminals is currently building a new 1.2 million TEU deep-water terminal in Lazaro Cardenas, Mexico, opening later this year and a new 1.3 million TEU deep water terminal in Moin, Costa Rica, opening in 2018.
PORTS
25 January 2016 - 21:30
Maersk's APMT signs Cartagena JV on hopes of Colombian growth
MAERSK's standalone port operator APM Terminals and Colombia's port operating company, Compania de Puertos Asociados SA have finalised a deal to form Cartagena Container Terminal Operator (CCTO).
PORTS
25 January 2016 - 21:30
Maersk's APMT signs Cartagena JV on hopes of Colombian growth
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