African port doubles in size

South Africa’s state-owned transport and logistics company Transnet has opened two more berths at Ngqura Container Terminal in the Eastern Cape, taking the port’s operating capacity to 1.5m teu, up from 800 000 teu, with a design capacity of 2.2m teu.

The ZAR2bn-plus (US$165m) investment included dredging to 16 m and purchase of equipment, including two megamax ship-to-shore-cranes, 18 RTGs, 48 haulers and 48 bathtub trailers.

The new berths, numbers 3 and 4, were official opened by public enterprises minister Lynne Brown who said: “This investment is significant to us as it strengthens the terminal’s capability to handle larger container vessels, improve efficiencies, vessel turnaround times and customer satisfaction.”