CANADA: The World Bank is assisting Malaysia to develop a national port strategy to better position its ports sector as a critical facilitator of economic growth.
A 10-month study that will provide recommendations that make up the core of the new strategy is underway and due to be completed in the first quarter of 2016.
According to the World Bank, the primary aim of the study is to define the role of government in planning, regulating, managing and empowering the ports sector as a driver of economic development as well as economic activity in its own right.
“While Malaysia has been successful in capturing increasing amounts of transshipment container volumes, consistently gaining share from Singapore since at least 2004, this outcome contrasts with a comparatively less successful track record of growth in hinterland (import-export) container and bulk volumes, particularly outside of the primary Port Klang complex,” the bank said in a description of the project.
A lack of effective and integrated government policy direction in terms of promoting trade competitiveness, increasing transport efficiency, and better integrating Peninsular Malaysia, Sabah, and Sarawak domestically and internationally, is thought to be behind the lack of success in this area, it added.
“Meanwhile, international competition for port market share has intensified across Southeast Asia, not only in traditional powerhouses like Singapore and Hong Kong, but in emerging, aspiring hubs like Vietnam and Indonesia that also have hinterlands that attract manufacturing and other import-export activity.”
The study is being carried out by the Hong Kong office of international consulting firm ICF International.
As well as reviewing Malaysia’s position in global and regional container shipping, the study will provide an assessment of challenges facing the country’s core container ports of Port Klang, Port of Tanjung Pelepas, Penang Port, Johor Port, Kuantan Port, Sepanggar Port, and Kuching Port. It will also investigate issues such as inter-port competition and the high cost-to-serve in the containerized trades of East Malaysia and identify whether opportunities exist for rationalization of port operations in Sabah and Sarawak.
