At least the Namibian goverment thinks things are going to get busy...
Namibia’s Walvis Bay port will undergo a 3 billion-Namibian-dollar ($302 million) expansion to enable it to handle as many as 1 million containers, the port authority said.
Construction is expected to begin by the end of the year, Bisey Uirab, the chief executive of the Namibian Ports Authority, said in a phone interview from Walvis Bay today. The deepwater port can handle 350,000 containers now.
Namibia is also planning a 30 billion-Namibian-dollar port project north of Walvis Bay, known as North Port, to service landlocked areas of the 15-nation Southern African Development Community, Uirab said. SADC is an association of countries stretching from South Africa in the south to the Democratic Republic of Congo in the north focused on development, economic growth, peace and security.
“Financing for the fuel offloading jetty and the storage facilities, which is the first phase of the North Port, will be provided by the Namibian government,” Uirab said. “We will seek financing as we develop the rest of the port. We are hoping that the private sector can play a significant role in this development.”
The North Port development is set to begin with the construction of a 1.5 billion-Namibian-dollar bulk fuel storage facility next year.
North Port could also include a dry bulk cargo terminal able to handle up to 100 million metric tons of goods, such as coal exports from Botswana, a passenger terminal and a ship and rig repair yard, Uirab said.
To contact the reporter on this story: Felix Njini in Windhoek at ckaira@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Antony Sguazzin at asguazzin@bloomberg.net
https://www.businessweek.com/news/2013-07-11/namibia-to-start-expanding-walvis-bay-port-terminal-by-year-end