The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) said it will gain a deep-water port of its own thanks to a deal reached with Dubai-based port terminal operator DP World.
The port, which will be located in Banana, will be the first deep-sea port in the country, DP World said.
The development will give the DRC the opportunity to be connected to global trade lanes and have access to various global markets, as well as reduce the country’s dependency on ports in neighboring countries, DP World explained.
DP World won a 30-year concession with an option for a 20-year extension for the management and development of the greenfield multi-purpose port along DRC's short coastline of 23 miles.
Today, the DRC’s chief seaport is Matadi, which is located 92 miles upriver from the mouth of the Congo River.
DP World will hold a 70 percent stake in the joint venture and the government of DRC will hold the remaining 30 percent share.
The first phase of the greenfield project, with an estimated initial investment of $350 million, will include a 600-meter quay and 25-hectare (62-acre) yard extension with a container capacity of 350,000 TEUs and 1.5 million metric tons of general cargo. Construction is expected to start this year and take approximately 24 months to complete.
The plan is to develop the port in four phases, costing more than $1 billion. Development will be dependent on market demand for the port, as well as industrial and logistics zone infrastructure.
“Investment in this deep-water port will have a major impact on the country’s trade with significant cost and time savings, attracting more direct calls from larger vessels from Asia and Europe, and ultimately acting as a catalyst for the growth of the country and the region’s economy," Sultan Ahmed Bin Sulayem, the group chairman and chief executive officer of DP World predicted.
Stacking up. Each year, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development publishes a liner shipping connectivity index, which purports to indicate "a country's integration level into global liner shipping networks.”
By that measure, China was the most connected, with an index of 158.8 in 2017, and the U.S. was the seventh most connected, with its index at 86.3.
Meanwhile, the DRC, despite a population estimated at 83 million by the CIA's World Factbook, was near the bottom of that list, with an index of 5.2, behind even tiny island nations such as the Marshall Islands, Samoa and the Comoros.