US$275m Russian port deal for Gulftainer

The agreement, believed to be the largest UAE private company investment in Russia to date, was signed between Badr Jafar, managing director of the Crescent Group and vice-chairman of Gulftainer, and Ust-Luga Port Company chairman, Valeriy Israylit at a ceremony in the presence of the Russian Prime Minister, Vladimir Putin, in Sochi on the Black Sea.

With the Western Baltic region handling around 60% of Russia’s container volumes, Ust-Luga is becoming a key port gateway providing an alternative to St Petersburg Port. Volumes through the Baltic have risen dramatically in recent years with scope for growth; the ratio of containers handled to population is still only 30 per 1000 people in Russia compared with 168 per 1000 in the EU.

Claiming to be the largest private terminal operator in the world and the first Middle Eastern port operator to invest in Russia’s Baltic region, Gulftainer and its partner say that they intend to ensure that the Russia gateway terminal at Ust-Luga will set new standards of efficiency and productivity, aiming to handle 170m tonnes of cargo when fully developed.