RIYADH: Saudi Arabia are well on the way to becoming world scale, world class facilities, delegates will hear at this year’s TOC Middle East conference to be held on 8-9 December 2015 at the Le Méridien Dubai Hotel & Conference Centre, Dubai, UAE.
Saudi Arabia is an economic giant of the Middle East Gulf and fittingly has some of the largest ports in the region. However, these ports are undergoing a period of transformation. The Kingdom’s position over decades as the world’s largest supplier of crude oil meant that most of its ports were designed to handle bulk liquids and project cargoes.
Although on a steadily upward path, Saudi Arabia’s container throughput still amounted to just 6.7 million TEU in 2013, according to the World Bank. But a growing middle class and youthful demographic profile has provided the impetus for the Kingdom to generate heavy investment in state-of-the-art container facilities.
Conscious of the need to provide top class commercial facilities, Saudi Ports Authority embarked on a privatization programme, working closely with private sector investors and operators to ready the country’s port sector for today’s shipping landscape.
The Saudi government has also announced plans to invest some $30bn in upgrading port and other related logistics facilities to enhance the capacity and competitiveness of the Kingdom’s ports as more and more ultra large container vessels (ULCVs) cascade onto maritime trades and container shipping lines group together in more powerful alliances.
Jeddah Islamic Port (JIP) is on the way to becoming a major maritime hub on the Red Sea. The aim is to capture a larger port share of the major Asia-Europe container trades as well as establish best-in-class import-export facilities for Saudi Arabia’s rapidly growing container volumes as the economy diversifies from its historical base of primary commodities towards more manufactured goods.
