WASHINGTON: The Port of Savannah and the autoport at Brunswick may be far enough away from Gwinnett County that they would seem like they have no local impact, but there are 25,144 people who would say otherwise. That’s the number of full- and part-time jobs that Georgia Ports Authority Executive Director Griffith Lynch said exist in Gwinnett County because of the authority and the cargo that passes through the state’s ports and heads inland.
Lynch said the port’s economic impact in the county during a presentation to the Gwinnett Chamber at the Infinite Energy Forum on Wednesday. More than 37,000 20-foot equivalent units of cargo move through the county, he said. “(The Georgia Ports Authority) is not an asset that belongs to Savannah or Brunswick,” Lynch said. “It belongs to the entire state of Georgia.”
Awareness of the Port of Savannah’s importance to the rest of the state has grown in recent years in light of expansion of the Panama Canal to accommodate the larger Panamax cargo ships. Lynch said those ships previously had to go through the Suez Canal, resulting in Savannah being the last port of call, after New York City and Norfolk, Va., for ships arriving in the U.S. Now that the Panama Canal can handle the ships as well, Savannah has a chance to be a first port of call for imports coming in on the Panamax ships and therefore see more cargo pass through the area, Lynch said. That’s already lead to increases in cargo moving through the port, he said.
