Pakistan’s First Deep Water Terminal

Pakistan to launch first deep water terminal this April

Pakistan first deep water terminal expects opening by April this year. The project has now entered into its final phase of development and officials report it will be opened for operation this April. The Karachi port terminal will be opened for mother vessels.

Mother vessels have a capacity to carry 17,000-18,000 containers of 20-foot each. There are few constraints of handling that hinder the entrance of large units in the current terminals. Presently, the container terminals the country house vessels have only the capacity to accommodate 8000 twenty feet equivalent units.

Why was there a need of this project?

The South Asia Pakistan Terminal (SAPT) official says that at present, large vessels bearing Cargo to Pakistan had to go to deep-sea Cargo ports of UAE like Jebel Ali to offload and reload the cargo on smaller vessels that can be accommodated by Pakistani shores.

This whole process elevated the cost as there is a huge percentage of cargo that comes in this category. The consequence of which is delayed shipping, extra documentation and overall inefficiency. This difficulty was to be addressed in order to avoid this extra workload. So the need arose for a project for Pakistan’s own deep water terminal.

Pakistan Deep Water Container Port (PDWCP) is currently working on its last project as for now. The project is meant to achieve 16-meter depth of the outer channel through dredging. The project is advancing steadily towards its completion as is considered one of a kind.

Role of KPT

KPT has played a crucial role so far by providing land for the terminal. It has paved the way for the success of this project by investing in construction of roads for easy transport of import as well as export Cargo from UK to Pakistan and to the terminal. KPT has also played role in facilitating the dredging of approach channel and port basin.

PDWCP Project details

Four companies showed interest in the project including companies from China and Belgium. Karachi Port Trust (KPT) shortlisted and assigned the responsibility of this project to contractors from Netherlands. The contractors, Van Oord Dredging and Marine Contractors BV, were awarded the project for 2.98 billion Pakistani rupees.

The company has a strict deadline for this cumbersome task. The agreed terms state that the development work has to be completed within a deadline of 120 days starting from the day of issuance of letter of commencement which was December 5, 2016. According to these terms, the assignment needs to be finished by April 4, 2017.

Total estimated cost of the project

The overall cost of project is estimated to be $1.4 billion which includes $800 million share of KPT and $600 million of SAPT. SAPT is a partner of KPT in this venture. In phase 2 of the project, the depth of the outer channel will be further enhanced to 18 meters which is planned to be completed by December 2018. SAPT has also showed keen interest in investing yet another $200 million in this later phase of the project.