Allan Odhiambo, the Eastafrican
6 June 2006
Nairobi — Trade between East Africa and China will get a major boost when the state-owned China Shipping Lines Company starts direct shipping services to the region in the next one-and-a-half months.
The company has already identified Kilindini port in Mombasa as its probable operational base.
The direct-service plans were announced early last week Kenya Ports Authority's during a tour of the facilities at the Inland Container Depot in Nairobi by a Chinese delegation led by the managing director of the China Shipping Agency, Captain Kong Bin. The delegation also toured facilities at the Kilindini port.
The United Arab Emirates-based China Shipping Agency represents the China state company in the Middle East and Africa.
In Kenya, the agency is represented by African Shipping Ltd. The delegation was conducted on the tour by KPA's principal engineer, Joseph Birir.
Captain Bin said his company was keen on boosting the growing trade between China and Africa noting that the Kilindini port was best suited as a base because of its adequate facilities and extensive hinterland, covering Kenya to eastern Congo.
The Kilindini port has in the recent past gone through a major modernisation programme to boost safety and efficiency standards in anticipation of growth.
Plans are also afoot to build a free trade zone on an already identified 18 hectare site to boost cargo throughput, which rose by 2.8 per cent in 2005, representing an increase of 360,624 tonnes of cargo on the 12,920,123 tonnes handled the previous year.
Captain Bin noted that his company's command of over 50 global routes in both shipping and logistics would give East Africa an advantage in reaching out to most markets.
China Shipping Lines, which owns the China Shipping Container Lines based in Shanghai, is the sixth largest shipping line in the world. It has a total of 450 vessels, 160 of which are container vessels, 140 break-bulk vessels, 100 tankers and 50 roll-on roll-off vessels.
Be the first to Write a Comment!
Copyright © 2006 The East African. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
