Algeciras Bay to invest €200m despite downturn

Announcing the investment, which will be twice the average figure of €100m for the last few years, Manuel Moron, APBA chairman, said the majority of the money will be used to fund the detached breakwater on the Isla Verde Exterior Quay container terminal.

The port retained its position as the leading Spanish port in 2008 after reaching a total cargo throughput of 74.8m tonnes for 2008, a slight increase of 0.34% over the previous year thanks to favourable trends in the containerised and liquid bulks sectors.

More than half this total (42.7 m tonnes) was containerised cargo, which saw a 0.8% increase, albeit that the actual container throughput fell by 2.6% to 3.32m teus in spite of imports increasing by 4%. Passenger numbers crossing the Strait of Gibraltar to Ceuta and Tangiers topped the 5m mark, whilst commercial ro-ro traffic saw a small increase to 211,770 vehicles.