More calls for Port Expansion

The project is just barely into its construction phase and already Don Krusel is being told to think bigger, much much bigger.

A Vancouver sun story today, examines port developments in Vietnam, Singapore and Malaysia which in total container handling capacity dwarf both Vancouver’s current capabilities and Prince Rupert’s potential capabilities. The impression from the article is that if Canada wants to seriousl cash in on the boom we need to think much larger than the present day.

The suggestion from the Asia-Pacific Foundation is more blunt, they suggest that Canada isn’t taking the idea of trade between North American and Asia as seriously as it should. Or as they not so gently put things “Western Canada's delayed response to the trade trends underscores a worrying inability to react decisively”. Ouch!

The boom in Asian trade as seen by the billions of dollars spent in the Asian Basin does tend to show that we’re a bit behind the curve on our side of the Pacific. But for Prince Rupert it’s another indication that "phases one and two" of our container port project may just be the beginning of a much larger shipping presence on the North coast.

Check out the entire story in the article reprinted below!

Asian ports pressure B.C.'s to expand
The Port of Vancouver handled 1.86 million TEUs (twenty-foot-container equivalent units) in 2004
By Wency Leung
Vancouver Sun
Tuesday, June 20, 2006

CREDIT: Vancouver Sun
Pumping cash into ports
Vietnam, Singapore and Malaysia are following China's lead in rapidly expanding their container ports to handle increasing global trade, putting further pressure on B.C. ports to grow, according to the Asia Pacific Foundation.

In a recent report titled Asia's Massive Container Port Development Pressures Canada to respond, the Vancouver-based think-tank said that the ports of Vancouver and Prince Rupert are lagging far behind their Asian counterparts when it comes to container-port development.
While Vancouver and Prince Rupert have an advantage over U.S. ports in their geographic proximity to Northeast Asia, the foundation said: "Western Canada's delayed response to the trade trends underscores a worrying inability to react decisively."

The Port of Prince Rupert is planning to open a new container facility in 2007, which would be able to handle 500,000 containers a year. Meanwhile, the Port of Vancouver intends to more than double its capacity by 2020.

The Port of Vancouver handled 1.86 million TEUs (twenty-foot-container equivalent units) in 2004.

But expansion at the Deltaport container terminal is still a year behind schedule, hampered by delays in an environmental assessment of the project, Vancouver Port Authority spokesman Duncan Wilson said.

He said the expansion project is expected to be completed for 2009.
In comparison, the Asia Pacific Foundation pointed to Vietnam, which began work earlier this month on a $250-million U.S., 1.5 million-TEU container terminal in Ho Chi Minh City. That terminal is expected to begin operating in 2008.

Singapore is currently building four new berths, adding to its four container terminals and two multipurpose terminals, which already have 41 berths, the foundation said. It said Singapore handled 22.4 million containers in 2005.

It also reported that Malaysia has a massive expansion project underway at its central west coast port of Klang. That port handled 5.5 million containers last year.

The foundation attributed the growth in container capacity throughout Asia to a surge in trade with China, which has undertaken massive port development projects in recent years.
Wilson, however, said B.C.'s port expansion projects can't be compared with the boom in activity in Asia.

"In China, they're building container terminals at a very rapid rate. They have different standards," he said.

"To compare what we're building directly with what they're building is not a fair standard. . . . . If we can deliver our projects on time, we'll be expanding at a rate we want to."

wleung@png.canwest.com

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PUMPING CASH INTO PORTS

Vietnam and Korea are adding to the massive expansion of port capacity already under way throughout Asia, as work began this month on a new 1.5 million TEU (20-foot equivalent) container terminal in Vietnam's Ho Chi Minh City.
New capital investment in port capacity

Shanghai: $14 billion US

South Korea: $8.8 billion US

Canada's West Coast: $2 billion Cdn*

U.S. West Coast: Under $2 billion US **

Mexico's West Coast: $500 million US

Vietnam: $250 million US

*Port of Vancouver -- $1.5 billion; Port of Prince Rupert -- $500 million

**Estimated: $450 million US at Port of Tacoma, no expansions currently under way at either L.A. or Long Beach, the two largest U.S. West Coast ports, Port of Oakland recently completed $1.2 billion US in terminal expansion.

© The Vancouver Sun 2006