East African Business Week (Kampala)
Edris Kisambira
2 June 2009
Nairobi — Kenya is to construct a $200m container terminal at Mombasa.
The government has borrowed KShs16 billion (about US$200 million) for that purpose from Japan.
The new terminal, to be ready by 2013, will expand Mombasa port's capacity by another 1.2 million containers.
"The governments of Kenya and Japan have already signed the agreement for the loan," William Mtengo, the Kenya Ports Authority- Uganda representative said last week.
Expanding the port's capacity is part of measures by the government of Kenya and Kenya Ports Authority (KPA) aimed at continuously improving services in order to remain competitive.
It is also aimed at ensuring smooth deliveries at the port and smooth movement of cargo along the northern corridor.
Mtengo said works on the new terminal will run together with dredging of the port channel to attain 15 metres of depth alongside.
"This will enable us serve fourth generation vessels of 4,500 containers capacity," Mtengo said.
Today, because the port has not been dredged for a long time, it is heavily silted and as a result it can only handle smaller ships carrying a maximum of 2,500 containers.
Over the past five years, cargo throughput at Mombasa has risen by over 40% or over 4 million tonnes. Today about 500,000 containers go through the port annually. In 2007, the port handled 14.4 million tonnes of cargo compared to the previous year when it handled 13.2 million tonnes.
Mtengo said ports are an essential part of the supply chain when business people import or export goods.
"Ports that will survive are those that have a well established logistics platform that enable users to communicate and to cut down costs of doing business," Mtengo said.
It is for this reason that he said the Kenya government has given priority to the transport sector with roads already being reconstructed after years of neglect. The Mombasa-Malaba and Busia highway is one such road that is being redone to facilitate trade.
Mtengo said the government is also in talks with different development partners and the private sector on opening an alternative port in Lamu.
Should Lamu be developed into a port, it will serve northern Kenya, southern Somalia, southern Ethiopia and southern Sudan.
The infrastructure network to be built there will open up those areas for trade and reduce their remoteness thereby improving on security and providing jobs to the people.
Meanwhile, KPA has moved to refute media reports that Kenya was blocking Ugandans at the port.
Mtengo said the facility, a container freight service station (CFSC) that was set up at a cost of UShs7 billion ($3.5 million) to handle all motor vehicles heading to Uganda, is outside the port and has no links with the port or KPA.
He re-affirmed that the port of Mombasa is not congested as the report in The Daily Monitor newspaper indicated.
The port has a capacity to handle 20 million tonnes of cargo annually and a holding capacity of 14,500 containers at any moment. Mtengo said that as at 7am on the day the article appeared, the port had a total of 7,620 containers which is way below capacity.
The port can also accommodate 3000 cars at any given time and held only 67 units as at 7am Wednesday last week.
Apparently, the problem is that the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) is yet to grant the Uganda Property Holdings (UPH)-run CFSC a licence to operate.
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Bravo Kenyans for the great projects they are making,these are the project which will uplift the living standard of many people leaving in isolations.Cautions should be taken otherwise it may lead to many conflicts since rebel groups are in many parts of neigbouring to this port project.
This seems to be good good bussiness deal for both countries. Lets make sure that all future plans are independantly made by Japan and Kenya.