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The Port of Salalah, which has been experiencing a downturn in container activity, has received an important boost with the news that French-based CMA CGM, the world’s third-largest container shipping line, will add two new weekly services, Noura Express and EPIC, to East Africa, and Europe, beginning the first week of December.
The Noura Express service on the East Africa trade lane operates four vessels of up to 2,755 teu capacity, linking the ports of Jebel Ali, Khor Fakkan, Mombasa, Mogadishu and Salalah. At Salalah, transshipment is available to CMA CGM’s Europe Pakistan India Consortium (EPIC) service, which links ports in South Asia, the Middle East Gulf, the Red Sea, the Mediterranean, and North Europe. EPIC is operated with eight vessels of up to 9,400 teu capacity.
“The introduction of the EPIC service to the Port of Salalah provides our customer base in Salalah with an additional opportunity for export to Europe, the Mediterranean and North Africa, as well as for imports from the Indian Subcontinent,” commented Port of Salalah chief executive, David Gledhill. He added, “The Noura Service call leverages the strategic location of Salalah to provide a new, fast cargo connection from East Africa to Europe, which can potentially be also used to accommodate Omani imports from Kenya and Somalia.”
Part of the APM Terminals group, the port of Salalah is now undergoing an expansion which will double the quay length, and increase dry bulk capacity to 20 million tons, and liquid bulk capacity to 6 million tons annually. The Port of Salalah, in which APM Terminals operates and holds a 30 per cent share, handled 3.03 million teu in 2014, along with 7.9 million tons of bulk cargo.
The Salalah 2030 initiative includes plans for US $15 billion in infrastructure investment in the Salalah Free Trade Zone by 2028 to create a larger regional shipping and commerce centre for the region, and a Phase 3 port expansion including three new container berths.
